The Infidel: A Story of the Great Revival

The Infidel: A Story of the Great Revival Page 18

by M. E. Braddon

  "The George Inn, Portsmouth.

  "The wretch who writes these lines would scarce presume to address you were it not to bid a farewell that is to be eternal. I have gone back to my old trade of soldiering, and am to sail from this place at the first favourable wind, to serve in North America under General Amherst, with a company of grenadiers, mostly volunteers like myself. 'Tis beginning life again at the bottom of the ladder; but the lowest rank in his Majesty's service is too high for the deserter from Christ. The chances of savage warfare may bring me that peace which I can never know in this world, and should I fall I shall expire in the hope of salvation, trusting that the Great Judge will be merciful to a sinner who dies in the service of his King and country.

  "If you ever think of me, madam, let it be with kindness, as of one tempted beyond his strength, and not a willing sinner.

  "GEORGE STOBART."

  She put the letter away in a secret drawer of her bureau, but she didnot read it a second time. The lines were engraved upon her memory. Shewas angry with him. She was sorry for him.

  The friend was lost, but the world remained; and Lady Kilrush flungherself with a new zest and eagerness into the modish whirlpool.

  London was empty, but Tunbridge Wells was at the zenith. She tookthe handsomest lodging in the little town, a stone's throw from thePantiles, with drawing-room windows looking over the Common, andcommanding all the gaiety of the place. She invited Patty Granger andher General to spend the season with her, having an idea that herold friend's joyous trifling would help her to be light-hearted andprevent her brooding upon the past. She had not omitted Mrs. Granger'sname last season when sending out cards for her drums and dances; butthis invitation to Tunbridge was a more intimate thing, and Patty wasoverwhelmed by her kindness. In the cosmopolitan crowd at the Wells, ina company where German princes and English dukes rubbed shoulders withtradesmen's wives from Smock-alley, and pickpockets newly released fromthe Counter, Antonia's beauty and reckless expenditure secured her anumerous following, and made her conspicuous everywhere. She could notsaunter across the Common with Mrs. Granger or Sophy Potter withoutattracting a crowd of acquaintance, who hung upon her steps like thecourt about the old King or the Princess of Wales.

  Miss Potter declared that the Wells was like heaven. In London she sawvery little fine company, and only went abroad with her mistress whenher ladyship visited the poor, or drove on shopping expeditions to thecity. But manners were less formal at the Wells; and Sophy went topicnics and frisked up and down the long perspective of country danceshand in hand with persons of quality.

  Never had Sophy known her mistress so eager for amusement as duringthis particular season. She was ready to join in every festivity,however trivial, however foolish, and diversions that had a spice ofeccentricity, like Lady Caroline Petersham's minced-chicken supper atVauxhall, seemed to please her most. She entertained lavishly, gavebreakfasts, picnics, dances, suppers--had a crowd at her tea-tableevery evening; and Mr. Pitt being at the Wells that year, she gaveseveral entertainments in his honour, notably an excursion to BayhamAbbey, in a dozen coaches and four, and a picnic dinner among theruins, at which the great minister--who had but lately grasped thesceptre of supreme power--flung off the burden of public care, forgothis gout and the dark cloud of war in Europe and America, Frederick'sreverses, misfortunes in Canada, while he sunned himself in Antonia'sbeauty, and absorbed her claret and champagne.

  "I could almost wish for another earthquake that would bury me underthese antique walls," he said gaily. "Sure, madam, to expire at yourfeet were a death more illustrious than the Assyrian funeral pile."

  "Sardanapalus was a worthless sybarite, sir, and the world could sparehim. England without Mr. Pitt must cease to be a nation."

  "Nay, but think how glad Newcastle would be, and how the old King wouldchuckle if a falling pillar despatched me. 'Twould be the one pleasingepisode in my history. His Majesty would order me a public funeral, inhis gratitude for my civility in dying. Death is a Prime Minister's aceof trumps, and his reputation with posterity sometimes hangs on thatlast card."

  The minister's visit to Tunbridge was shortened by the news ofthe taking of Cape Breton and the siege of Louisbourg, the firstsubstantial victory that English arms had won in America sinceBraddock's disastrous rout on the Monongahela. Amherst and his dragoonshad landed on that storm-beaten coast in the nick of time. Thearistocratic water-drinkers and the little shopkeepers at the Wellsrejoiced as one man. Bonfires blazed on the Common, every window wasilluminated, martial music was heard on every side, toasts were drunk,glasses broken, and a general flutter of excitement pervaded the Wells,while in London a train of French standards were being carried toWestminster Abbey, to the sound of trumpets and kettle-drums, and thewild huzzas of the populace.

  Antonia wondered whether George Stobart had fallen among the Englishdragoons fighting in the trenches, of whose desperate courage oldGeneral Granger talked so glibly. She heard of heavy losses on bothsides. She pictured him lying among the unconsidered dead, while thecross of St. George waved above the shattered ramparts, and the gunsroared their triumphant thunder. She read the newspapers, half in hope,half in fear of finding Stobart's name; but it was not till GeneralAmherst's despatches were made public some time later that her mind wasset at rest, and she knew that he lived and had done well.

  That little season at Tunbridge, where people had to stay six weeksfor a water-cure, was a crowning triumph for Antonia as a woman of_ton_. Never till now had she so concentrated her thoughts upon thefutilities of pleasure, never so studied every bill of fare, or socarefully planned every entertainment. Her originality and her lavishoutlay made her the cynosure of that smaller great world at the Wells.Everybody applauded her taste, and anticipated her ruin.

  "The woman has a genius for spending, which is much rarer than a geniusfor saving," said a distinguished gourmand, who dined twice a weekat Antonia's lodgings. "A fool can waste money; but to scatter goldwith both hands and make every guinea flash requires a great mind. Idoubt Lady Kilrush will die a pauper; but she will have squandered herfortune like a gentlewoman."

  Lady Peggy Laroche was at the Wells, and spent most of her leisure withAntonia. While approving her _protegee's_ taste she urged the necessityof prudence.

  "Prythee, child, do not fancy your income inexhaustible. Remember,there is a bottom to every well."

  "Dear Lady Peggy, Goodwin could tell you that I am a woman of business,and have a head for figures. I am spending lavishly here, but when theseason is over I shall go to Kilrush with Sophy and a footman, andmope through the winter with my books and my harpsichord; and if yourladyship would condescend to share my solitude I should need no morefor happiness."

  "You are vastly kind, child, to offer to bury me before my time; butI am too old to hibernate, and must make the most of my few remainingwinters in London or Paris."

  "If you knew the romance and wild grandeur of that granite coast."

  "Bond Street is romantic enough for me, _ma douce_. I depend uponliving faces, not granite rocks, for my amusement, and would ratherhave the trumpery gossip of St. James's than the roar of the Atlantic."

  After having sparkled at the Wells and lived in a perpetual _va etvient_ of modish company, Lady Kilrush found life on the shores ofthe Atlantic somewhat monotonous. Her nearest neighbours were tenmiles off. Dean Delany's clever wife could find hourly diversions in acountry seat near Dublin, where she could give a dance or a big dinnerevery week, and had all the Court people from the Castle running inupon her; but at Kilrush the solitude was only broken by visits fromIrish squires and their wives, who had nothing in common with themistress of the house. Antonia could have endured an unbroken isolationbetter than the strain of trying to please uninteresting acquaintance.She devoted a good deal of her leisure to visiting the cottagers on herown estate, and ministered to every case of distress that came wit
hinher knowledge, whether on her own soil or an absentee neighbour's. Shetook very kindly to the peasantry, accepted their redundant flatterywith a smile, and lavished gifts on old and young. To the old, the_invalides du travail_, her heart went out with generous emotion. Tohave laboured for a lifetime, patient as a horse in the shafts, and tobe satisfied with so little in the end; just the winter seat by thesmouldering turf, by courtesy a fire; just to lie in front of the hutand bask in the summer sunshine; just not to die of starvation.

  The Gaffers and Gammers fared well while Antonia was at Kilrush; andbefore leaving she arranged with her steward for tiny pensions to bepaid regularly until her return.

  "You are not to be worse off for my going to England," she told one ofher old men, when she bade him good-bye.

  "Sure, me lady, we should be the worse off for want of your beautifulface, if you was to lave us the Bank of Ireland," replied Gaffer.

  She went back to London in December, in a Government yacht thatnarrowly escaped calamity, after waiting at Waterford over a week forfavourable weather. But Antonia enjoyed the storm; it thrilled in everynerve, and set her pulses beating, and gave her something to think of,after the emptiness of a life too free from worldly cares.

  She could return to her house in St. James's Square without fearof being troubled by the presence of the man who had made the wordfriendship a sound that sickened her. That traitor was far away.

  Assured of his absence, she went back to the slums by Lambeth Marsh,where she was received with rapture. Her pensioners had not beenforgotten while she was away, since she had provided for all themost pressing cases; but her return was like the coming of Aprilwarmth after a bitter winter. Everywhere she heard lamentations atMr. Stobart's departure, although Wesley had filled his place withanother of his helpers, an indefatigable worker, but a raw youth ofunsympathetic manners and uncompromising doctrine. He was barely civilto Lady Kilrush when they happened to meet, having been told thatshe was an unbeliever, and did all in his power to discourage herministrations among his people.

  "If your ladyship came to them with the Bible in your hand they mightbe the better for your kindness," he said severely; "but the carnalcomforts of food and drink, which your generosity provides for them,only serve to make them careless of everlasting bliss."

  "What, sir, would you starve them into piety? Do you think 'tis onlybecause they are miserable upon earth that Christians long for the joysof heaven? That is to hold the everlasting kingdom mighty cheap. Yourgreat Exemplar had a broader philosophy, and did not disdain to feed aswell as to teach His followers."

  Antonia's heart was moved at the thought of the pretty young wifedeserted by her husband, and living in solitude, without thedistractions of fine company, or the delight in books and music whichfilled the blank spaces in her own life. Impelled by this compassionatefeeling, she called on Mrs. Stobart one wintry afternoon, soon afterher return from Ireland, and was received with gratification which wasmainly due to the splendour of her coach, and the effect it would haveon the neighbours.

  "Your ladyship has doubtless heard that my husband has gone back tothe army?" said Lucy, when her visitor was seated in the prim frontparlour, where the mahogany furniture shone with an increased polish,and where there prevailed that chilling primness which marks a roomthat nobody uses. "It was a sad blow to me and to Mr. Wesley; butGeorge always hankered after his old profession, though he knew it wasSatan's choicest trade."

  "Nay, Mrs. Stobart, I cannot think that Satan has any part in thecalling of men who fight and die for their country. I doubt yourhusband's life in America will be as unselfish as his life in Lambeth."

  "'He has taken his hand from the plough.' That is what Mr. Wesley said.'He was the best of my helpers, and he has deserted me,' he said. AndMr. Wesley was sorry for my trouble in being forsaken by my husband."

  She shed a few feeble tears as she dwelt upon her own dull life; butshe did not seem deeply impressed by the thought of her husband'speril, or the chance that he might never come back to her.

  "It was a cruel disappointment for me," she complained. "He hadpromised to join the Church of England, and then we might have had avicarage, and he would have stayed at home, and only preached in hisparish church. He had promised to be a kinder husband."

  "Kinder? Oh, Mrs. Stobart, was he ever unkind?" exclaimed Antonia,kindling with the sense of injustice. She had noted his gentleness--hissupreme patience with the unsympathetic wife; so inferior to him inmind and heart--a pink and white nullity.

  "It was unkind to leave me while he went about the country preaching;it was unkind to go back to the army and leave me alone for years, morelike a widow than a wife. And father comes and teases me for money nowthat George is away. He dursn't ask for more than his allowance whileGeorge was here."

  "Your father is--a troublesome person?" inquired Antonia.

  "I should think he was indeed. He kept himself tolerably sober whilemother was alive. She used to spend every penny on drink, and heused to beat her for it, and both of them used to beat me. It wasa miserable life. Mother died in the hospital three years ago; andwhen she was gone the thought of his unkindness to her seemed to preyupon father's mind, and he was always at the gin-shop, and lost hissituation in the printing-office where he had worked half his life; andthen he came to us with a pitiful story, and my husband gave him tenshillings a week, which was more than he could afford, without denyinghimself, only George never minded. I don't think he would have mindedif he had been obliged to live like John the Baptist in the wilderness."

  "And now Mr. Stobart is gone your father troubles you?"

  "Indeed he does, madam. He comes for his money on a Saturday, lookingsuch an object that I'm ashamed for the servant to see him; and thenhe comes again on Tuesday or Wednesday, and tells me he's starving,and sheds tears if I refuse to give him money. And I'm obliged torefuse him, or he wouldn't leave me a sixpence to keep the house. Andthen father goes down the steps abusing me, and using the wickedestlanguage, on purpose for the neighbours to hear him. And he comes againand again, sometimes before the week is out."

  The idea of this sordid trouble oppressed Antonia like a nightmare.She thought of her own father--so kind, so pleasant a comrade, yetunprincipled and self-indulgent. It needed perhaps only the lower gradeto have made him as lost a creature.

  "Let me give you some money for him," she said eagerly. "It will be apleasure for me to help you."

  "Oh, no, no, madam. I know how generous you are; but George would neverforgive me if I took your ladyship's money. Besides, it would only dofather harm. He would spend it upon drink. There's no help for it.Father is my cross, and I must just bear it. He has come to live inthe Marsh, on purpose to be near me; and he makes believe that he'slikely to get work as a book-keeper at the glass works. As if anybodywould employ a man that's never sober! And he's a clever man too, yourladyship, and has read more books than most gentlemen. But he neverwent to a place of worship, and he never believed in anything but hisown cleverness. And see where that has brought him! Sure I beg yourladyship's pardon," concluded Lucy, hastily, "I forgot that you was offather's way of thinking."

  "You have at least the consolation of your son's affection, Mrs.Stobart, and it must be pleasant for you to watch the growth of hisintelligence. Is he as healthy and as handsome as when I saw him last?"

  "Handsomer, I think, your ladyship."

  "Will he be home from school presently? I should love to see him."

  "Nay, madam, that's impossible, for he is living at the Bath with hisgrandmother, Lady Lanigan. Mr. Stobart wrote to her before he leftPortsmouth, a farewell letter that melted her hard heart. 'Twas afterthe news of the taking of Louisburg, when her ladyship came here in aterrible fantig, and almost swooned when she saw the boy, and swore hewas the image of his father at the same age."

  "And she carried him away with her on a visit?"

  "Yes, madam. She begged so hard that I could not deny her. For yousee, madam, he is her only grandson; and there's a fortune go
ingbegging, as you may say. His father was too proud to try and bring herround; but if Georgie behaves prettily, who knows but she may send himto Eton--where his father was bred--and leave him the whole of herfortune?"

  "True, madam. No doubt you have done best for your boy. But I fear youmust feel lonely without him."

  "Oh, I missed him sadly for the first week or two, madam; but a childin a house, where there's but one servant, is a constant trouble. Inand out, in and out with muddy shoes, morning, noon, and night. 'Tisclean, clean, clean after them all day long, and it makes one's girlcross and impudent. He has his grandma's own woman to wash and dresshim, and a footman to change his shoes when he comes in from thestreet."

  "Is the visit to last long?"

  "That depends upon his behaviour, and if her ladyship cottons to him."

  "Well, so long as you can do without him, of course 'tis best," saidAntonia, in a dull voice.

  Her mind was wandering to that exile whose name she would notpronounce. To have sacrificed station and fortune for such a wife asthis--for a woman without heart or brains, who had not enough naturalfeeling to tremble for a husband in danger, or to grieve at the absenceof an only child!

  * * * * *

  After a few visits to her Lambeth pensioners, Lady Kilrush wearied ofthe work, and allowed herself to be charitable by deputy. She hatedthe starched prig who had taken Stobart's place in the parish. Shemissed the quick sympathy, the strength and earnestness of the man whohad helped her to understand the world's outcasts; and as her socialengagements were more numerous than last winter, she abandoned theattempt to combine philanthropy with fashion, and made Sophy her deputyin the Marsh.

  Sophy had a tender heart, and loved to distribute her ladyship'sbounty. She liked the priggish Wesleyan, Mr. Samson Barker, wholectured and domineered over her, but who was a conscientious youth,and innocent of all evil, the outcome of nonconformist ancestors,a feeble specimen of humanity, with a high narrow forehead, paleprotuberant eyes, and a receding chin. Impressed by his mental andmoral superiority, Sophy, who began by ridiculing him, soon thought himbeautiful, and held it one of her highest privileges to sit under hisfavourite preacher, Mr. William Romaine, at St. Olave's, Southwark,and to be allowed to invite Mr. Barker to Antonia's tea-table now andthen, where his appearance was a source of amusement to the rest ofthe company, who declared that her ladyship was at heart a Methodist,though she read Tindal and Toland, and affected liberal ideas.

  "Before next season we shall hear of you among the Lady Bettys andLady Fannys who throng Lady Huntingdon's drawing-room, and intoxicatetheir senses with Whitefield's raving," said one of her adorers; "andthen there will be no more dinners and suppers, no more dances anddrums--only gruel and flannel petticoats for old women."

  Lady Kilrush drained the cup of London pleasures that winter, and wasa leader in every aristocratic dissipation, shining like a star in allthe choicest assemblies, but so erratic in her movements as to win forherself the sobriquet of "the Comet."

  "The last spot of earth where 'twould seem reasonable to expect you isthe place where one is most likely to find you," Mr. Walpole told herone night, at a dinner of hard-drinking and hard-playing politicians,where Antonia, Lady Coventry, and a couple of duchesses were the onlywomen in a party of twenty.

  She had adorers of every age, from octogenarian peers, and generalswho had fought under Marlborough, to beardless boys just of age andsquandering their twenty thousands a year at White's and the CocoaTree. The fact that she kept every admirer at the same distance madeher irresistible. To be adamant where other women were wax; to receivethe flatteries of trifling fops, the ardent worship of souls of flame,with the same goddess air, smiling at her victims, kind to all, butparticular to none! That deliberate and stately North Briton, LordDunkeld, hung upon her footsteps with an untiring devotion that was thedespair of a score of young women of quality, who wanted to marry him,and thought they had pretensions for the place.

  'Twas a season of unusual gaiety, as if the thirst for pleasure wereintensified by the news of the war, and the consciousness of fellowcountrymen starving, perishing, massacred, scalped, or burnt alive, inthe pathless forests across the Atlantic. The taking of Louisburg hadset all England in a tumult of pride and delight, to the forgetfulnessof the catastrophe at Ticonderoga, where there had been terrible lossesunder Abercromby, and of the death of Lord Howe, the young, the ardent,the born leader of men, slain by the enemy's first volley.

  George Stobart's name figured in Amherst's despatches. He had foughtin the trenches with his old regiment; he had been with Wolfe in thestorming of Gallows Hill; and had been recommended for a commission onaccount of his gallant behaviour. People complimented Antonia about her"pious friend."

  The King was near dying at the beginning of the winter, and the lion atthe Tower happening to expire of old age, while his Majesty lay ill,the royal beast's dissolution was taken as a fatal augury, and hismaster was given over by the gossips. But King George recovered, andSunday parties, drums and masquerades, auctions, ridottos, oratorios,operas, plays, and little suppers, went on again merrily all throughthe cold weather.

  In the summer of 1759 Lady Kilrush carried out a long-cherished designof revisiting Italy. When last in that country her father's criticalstate of health had been a drag upon her movements. She would go therenow a free agent, with ample leisure to explore the region in whichshe was most keenly interested, those romantic hills above the Lake ofComo, where her mother's birthplace was to be found.

  She took Sophy, her French maid, Rodolphine, and her first footman, whowas an Italian, and travelled by Ostend and the Hague and the Rhineto Basle, then by Lucerne and Fluellen, to the rugged steeps of theSt. Gothard, loitering on the road, and seeing all the churches andpicture-galleries that were worth looking at, her travelling carriagehalf full of books, and her maid and footman following in a post-chaisewith the luggage, which was a lighter load of trunks and imperials thana woman of _ton_ might have been supposed to require, her ladyship'stravelling toilette being of a severe simplicity.

  When George II. was king there was a luxury of travelling, which madeamends for the want of the _train de luxe_ and the _wagon-lit_. It wasthe luxury of slowness; the delicious leisure of long days in the midstof exquisite scenery--by lake, and river, and mountain pass--that hadtime to grow into the mind and memory of the traveller; journeys inwhich there were long oases of rest; perfumed summer nights in quietplaces, where the church bell was the only sound; mornings in obscuregalleries where one picture in a catalogue of a hundred was a gem tobe remembered ever after; glimpses of humble lives, saunterings inmarket-places, adventures, perils perhaps, an alarm of brigands, earslistening for a sudden shot ringing sharp among snow-clad hills--allthe terrors, joys, chances, surprises of a difficult road; and at one'sinn a warmth of welcome and a deferential service that in some wiseatoned for bad cooking and ill-furnished rooms.

  To Antonia that Italian journey offered a delicious repose from thefever of London pleasures. After George Stobart's departure for Americathere had been a jarring note in the harmony of life--a note that hadto be drowned somehow; and hence had come that craving for excitement,that hastening from one trivial pleasure to another, which had made herso conspicuous a figure in the London of last winter.

  In the solemn silence of everlasting hills, in a solitude that to Sophyseemed a thing of horror, Antonia thought of her last season; thecrowded rooms, reeking with odours of pulvilio and melting wax, thepainted faces, the atmosphere of heat and hair-powder, the diamonds;the haggard looks and burning eyes, round the tables where play ranhigh; the hatred and malice; the jests that wounded like daggers; thesmiles that murdered reputations.

  "Shall I ever go back to it all, and think a London season life'ssupreme felicity?" she wondered, standing in front of the Capuchins'Hospice, among the granite peaks of the St. Gothard, in the chillmountain air, while the mules were being saddled for the descent intoItaly. They had ridden yesterday morning throu
gh the Urnerloch--thatwonderful passage of two hundred feet through the solid rock, whichhad been made early in the century--by the green meadows of Andermatt,and across the Ursern valley; they had wound slowly upward through awild and barren region to the friendly hospice where there was alwayswelcome and shelter.

  Lady Kilrush had left her English travelling carriage at Lucerne,and the journey from Airolo to Como would be made in an Italianpost-chaise. Her footman was a native of Bellinzona, and was able toarrange all the details of their route.

  At Como she hired one of the country boats, new from the builders,and engaged four stalwart Italian boatmen, who were to be in herservice while she made a leisurely tour of the lake, stopping whereverthe scene pleased her fancy, and putting up with the most primitiveaccommodation, provided the inn were clean, and the prospect beautiful.

  That year of 1759, remarkable for the success of British arms inEurope, Hindostan, and America, the "great year," as Horace Walpolecalls it, was also a year of golden weather, a summer of sunshine andcloudless skies, and Antonia revelled in the warmth and light of thatlovely scene. It seemed as if every drop of blood in her veins rejoicedin the glory of her mother's birthplace. Here, in what spot she knewnot, but somewhere along these sunlit hills that sloped gently to thelake, her mother's early years had been spent. She would have givenmuch to find the spot; and in her long rambles with Sophy, or alone,she rarely passed a church without entering it, and if she could findthe village priest rarely left him till he had searched the registerof marriages for her father's name. But no such name appeared in thosehumble records; and she thought that her father might have carried hisfugitive bride to Milan, or even into Switzerland, before the marriageceremony was possible; the girl being under age, and the bridegroom aheretic. She looked with interest at every villa that sheltered a noblefamily, and questioned the peasants, and the people of the inn, aboutall the important inhabitants of their neighbourhood, hoping to hear insuch or such a patrician family of a runaway marriage with a wanderingEnglishman. But the old people to whom she chiefly addressed herselfhad no memory of such an event.

  It was the beginning of September, and the scene and atmospherehad lost nothing of their charm by familiarity, so having made thetour of the lake villages, and being somewhat tired of rough fare,ill-furnished rooms, and most of all of Sophy's repinings for thecomforts of St. James's Square, Lady Kilrush hired a villa near thequaint little town of Bellagio, a villa perched almost at the pointof the wooded promontory, with a garden that sloped to the water'sedge. The villa belonged to one of Antonia's fashionable friends--acertain Lady Despard, a banker's widow, who gave herself more airsthan an empress, and preferred Rome or Florence to London, becauseof the superior consequence her wealth gave her in cities where themeasure of her rank was not too precisely known. This lady--aftertrying to imitate Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, and live among a peasantpopulation--had wearied of her villa and the little town at hergates, the church bells, the voices of the fishermen, the feasts andprocessions, and lack of modish company; and her house was to be letfurnished with all its amenities.

  Antonia engaged the villa for a month, at a liberal rent, andestablished herself, with Giuseppe, the Italian footman, as hermajor-domo, and a modest household of his selection; not a household ofmuch polish or experience, but of willing hands, smiling faces, eyesthat sparkled and danced with the golden light of Italy. Antonia was athome and happy among these people, who served her as it were upon theirknees, and whose voices had a note that was like a caress.

  "I can understand how my mother loved her garden of roses, her chestnutwoods, and long terraces where the vines make a roof of shade, and howshe must have pined in a dull English village--a Lincolnshire village,dismal flats without a tree, straight roads, and church steeples, withthe lead-coloured sea making a level line in the distance, that seemslike the end of the world. Alas, to her eyes, accustomed to thisgolden land, these mountains climbing up to heaven, how heart-breakingit must all have been!"

  Summer in Italy, summer on the Lake of Como. Never till now had Antoniaknown what summer means--that perfect glory of sunlight, that magicalatmosphere, half golden light and half azure haze, in which earthlythings put on the glory of a dream. Never before had she enjoyed therestfulness of a land where the atmosphere and the light are enough forhappiness, a sensuous happiness, perhaps, but leaving the spirit wingsfree for flight. After the stress and tumult of a London winter, thestrife of paltry ambitions, the malevolence that called itself wit,the aching sense of loneliness in a crowd, what bliss to loll at easein the spacious country boat, under the arched awning, while the oarsdipped, and the water rippled, and life went by like a sleep! She hadalmost left off remembering the days of the week, the passage of time.She only knew that the moon was waning. That great golden disk whichhad bathed the hills in light and tempted her to loiter on the laketill midnight, was no more. There was only a ragged crescent that rosein the dead of night and filled her with melancholy. She stood at heropen window, in the dark hour before dawn, drinking the cool sweet air,and full of sorrowful thoughts.

  Where was George Stobart under that dwindling moon? In what grim andfrowning wilderness, amidst what desolate waste of mountains, in whatwild scene of savage warfare, hemmed round by painted foes, deafened bywar cries more hideous than the howling of the wolves in the midnightwoods, done to death by the ingenious cruelties of human fiends, ordying of famine and neglected wounds, crawling on bleeding feet tillthe wearied body dropped across the narrow track that the tramp ofsoldiers had worn through the wilderness, dying forsaken and alone,perhaps, in the pitilessness of a panic flight.

  Her heart ached as she thought of him. Alas, why had he been falseto his own convictions, to his own faith? She knew that he had oncebeen sincere, had once been strong in a hope that she could not share.When first she knew him he had been a good man. She looked back, andrecalled the domestic picture--the rustic lawn basking in the Junesunshine, the warm air perfumed with pinks and southernwood, and thehusband seated in his garden reading to his wife. She had lookeddown at him from the proud height of her philosophy, had scorned hisunquestioning belief in things unseen; but she had respected him forhis renunciation of all the luxuries and pleasures the common herd love.

  Of the progress of the American campaign since the victory at CapeBreton she knew very little. The posts between Italy and England wereof a hopeless irregularity, and the newspapers which she had orderedto be sent her were more than half of them lost or stopped on the way,while an occasional gossiping letter from a fashionable friend told hermore of the new clothes at the Birthday than the triumphs or reversesof British arms. The London papers were at this time more concernedabout Prince Ferdinand's victory over the French at Minden, and LordGeorge Sackville's strange backwardness in following up the Prince'ssuccess, than about the fortunes of Amherst or Forbes, and the wildwarfare of the West.

  It was perhaps from the desire to be better informed that Antonia wasglad to see Lord Dunkeld, who surprised her by alighting from a boat atthe landing stage of her villa, in the first week of her residence. Hefound her sitting in her garden, dreaming over a book. He had arrivedat Varenna on the previous evening, he told her, and meant to stop sometime at the inn, which commanded a fine view of the two lakes, and hadbetter accommodation than was usual in out-of-the-way places.

  "May one ask what brings your lordship to Italy, when most of the finegentlemen I know are shooting partridges in Norfolk?" Antonia asked,when they were seated on a marble bench in front of the lake.

  There was a fountain on the lawn near them, and oleanders white andred, masses of blossom and delicate lance-shaped leaves, made a screenagainst wind and sun, and there were red roses trailing all along themarble balustrade above the lake, and poppies pink, and red, and white,and pale pink cyclamen, filled a circular bed at the base of a statueof Flora, and all the garden seemed alive with colour and light. Adouble flight of steps, broad and shallow, went down to the water, andDunkeld's boat was moored there, with his t
wo boatmen lounging underthe awning, idle and contented. It is a stiff pull from Varenna to thepoint, when the wind is blowing from Lecco.

  "Will your ladyship scorn me if I confess that I love better to sitin an Italian garden than to tramp over a Norfolk stubble? There is adelicate freshness in the scent of a turnip field at early morning; butI prefer roses, and the company of one woman in the world."

  "Oh, my lord, keep your compliments for St. James's. They are out ofharmony with my life here."

  "Am I to have no license to say foolish things, after having crossedthe Alps to see you?"

  "Oh, sir, I am very credulous, but I cannot believe you have been sosimple as to travel over a thousand miles for a pleasure that you couldenjoy next month in London."

  "I should have died of that other month. I bore your absence as longas I could, and questioned all your friends and your hall-porter todiscover any hope of your return. But no one would satisfy me, and myheart sickened of uncertainty. So ten days ago I ordered my chaise forDover, and have scarce drawn rein till last night at Varenna, whereI heard of your ladyship. Nay, spare me that vexed look. I come as afriend, not as an importunate suitor. Do you suppose I forget that I amforbid all ecstatic hopes?"

  She gave a troubled sigh, and rose from the bench, with an agitated air.

  "Lady Kilrush, cannot you believe in friendship?" he asked, followingher.

  "Hardly. I have believed, and have had my confidence betrayed."

  "When you told me that I could never be your husband, that a life'sdevotion, the adoration of the Indian for his God, could not move yourheart to love me, I swore to school myself to indifference, thoughtit was possible to live contentedly without you. I have not learntthat lesson, madam; but I have taught myself to think of your merits,your perfections, as I might of a sister's; and I ask you to give mesomething of a sister's regard. You need not fear me, madam. Youth andthe ardour of youth have gone by. I doubt you know that I was unhappyin an early attachment, and that the exquisite creature who was tohave been my wife died in my arms in her father's park, struck bylightning. She was but eighteen, and I less than three years older.The stroke that should have taken us both, and sealed our love foreternity, left me to mourn her, and to doubt God's goodness, till timechastened my rebellious thoughts."

  "I have heard that sad story, my lord, and have understood why you weremore serious than other men of your age and circumstances. You havebeen happy in finding the consolations of religion."

  "Alas, madam, to be without a fixed hope in a better world is to livein the midst of chaos. A Christian's faith is like a lamp burningat the end of a long dark passage. No matter if it seem but aninfinitesimal point of light in the distance, 'twill serve to guide hisfootsteps through the gloom."

  "Would not duty, honour, conscience do as much for him?"

  "Perhaps, madam, since conscience is but another name for the fearof God. Be sure the time will come when a mind so superior as yourswill be awakened to the truth; but I doubt the Christian religionhas suffered in your esteem by your acquaintance with Mr. Stobart.The conversation of a fanatical Methodist, the jargon of Wesley andWhitefield, their unctuous cant repeated parrot-wise by a tyro, couldbut move your disgust."

  "Indeed, my lord, you wrong my cousin, George Stobart," Antoniaanswered eagerly. "He is no canter--no parrot-echo of another man'swords. His sacrifice of fortune and station should vouch for hissincerity."

  "Oh, we will say he is of the stuff that makes martyrs, if yourladyship pleases; but 'tis a pity that a gentleman of birth andbreeding--a soldier--should have taken up with the Methodist crew.Some one told me he has the gift of preaching. I doubt he expoundsthe doctrine of irresistible grace in Lady Huntingdon's kitchen,for the vulgar, while Whitefield thumps a cushion in her ladyship'sdrawing-room."

  "My cousin has left off preaching for these two years last past, sir,and is fighting for his king in North America."

  "Gad's life! Then he is a better man than I took him for, when hispuritan countenance and grey suit passed me in your ladyship's hall.The American campaign is no child's play. Even our sturdy Highlandershave been panic-struck at the cruelties of those Indian fiends, whosewar-whoops surpass the Scottish yell as a tiger outroars an ox."

  "Can your lordship tell me the latest news of the war?"

  "'Tis a tale of barren victories and heavy losses. Englishmen andcolonials have fought like heroes, and endured like martyrs; but Idoubt the end of the campaign is still far off. The effect of lastyear's victory at Louisburg, at which we in England made such anuproar, was weakened by Abercromby's defeat at Ticonderoga, and byAmherst's refusal to risk an immediate attack upon Quebec. Had he takenWolfe's advice Canada would have been ours before now; but Amherst evererred on the side of caution. He is all for forts and block-houses,deliberation and defence--Wolfe all for the glorious hazards of attack."

  "Then I doubt my cousin, Mr. Stobart, would sooner be with Wolfe thanwith Amherst."

  "Is the gentleman such a fire-eater?"

  "I believe he loves war, and would hate shilly-shally no less than Mr.Wolfe," Antonia answered, with a deep blush, and a sudden embarrassment.

  The desperate mood in which Stobart left England had been in her mindas she spoke.

  "Well, if he is with Amherst he has not seen much fighting since heleft Cape Breton. Does he not write to you occasionally?"

  "No, he writes only to his wife, and not often to her."

  "'Tis not easy for a soldier on the march through a wilderness todespatch a letter--or even to write one," said Lord Dunkeld.

  After this his lordship's boat was moored by the villa landing-stage insome hour of every day. His society was not unpleasant to Antonia inher Italian solitude. He had sworn to be her friend; and she thoughtshe had at last discovered a man capable of friendship. She had no fearof being taken off her guard, shocked and insulted, as she had been byGeorge Stobart. Here was no slumbering volcano, no snake in the grass,only a grave and dignified gentleman, of unimpeachable honour, and anold-fashioned piety, fully impressed by his own importance, who wouldfain have won her for his wife, but who, disappointed in that desire,wished to keep her for his friend.

  He was six-and-thirty years of age, and that tragedy of his youth hadexercised a sobering influence over all his after-life. He was a fineclassical scholar, and had read much, and travelled much, but showedhimself a true Briton by his ignorance of every living language excepthis own. A courier and a French valet saved him all communicationwith innkeepers and their kind, and a smile or a stately wave of thehand sufficed to make his wishes known to his Varenna boatmen. Heloved Italy as a picture, without wanting to get any nearer the livingfigures in the foreground.

  There was a festa at Bellagio on the Sunday after his arrival--a festaof thanksgiving for the fruits of the year, and he attended Antonia andSophy to the church, where there was to be a solemn service, and thepriestly benediction upon gifts provided by the faithful, which wereafterwards to be sold by auction for the benefit of church and poor.

  The piazza in front of the church was dazzling in the fierce afternoonsunshine when Antonia and Sophy climbed the steep street, and foundthemselves among the populace standing about the square, the womenwith babies in their arms, and little children at their knees, and themaimed and halt and blind and deaf and dumb, who seem to make up halfthe population of an Italian town on a Sunday afternoon.

  The natives gazed in admiring wonder at the beautiful face under thebroad Leghorn hat, with white ostrich feathers and diamond buckle,the tall figure in the straight simplicity of white muslin and a longblue sash, that almost touched the points of the blue kid shoes, thebeautiful throat and pearl necklace showing above the modest muslinkerchief. Sophy was in white muslin also, but Sophy being low infigure, must needs affect a triple frilled skirt and a frilled muslincape, which gave her the shape of a penwiper.

  "Did I not know you superior to all petty arts I might say you dressedyour waiting-woman to be a foil to your beauty," Lord Dunkeld toldAntonia, when So
phy was out of earshot.

  "Miss Potter chooses her own clothes, and I can never persuade her towear anything but the latest fashion. She has but to see the pictureof a new mode in the _Ladies' Magazine_, and she is miserable till shetries it on her own person."

  They went into the church, where the hot sunlight was intensified bythe pervading decoration, and the high altar glowed like a furnace.The marble pillars were covered with crimson brocade, and long crimsoncurtains hung from the roof, making a tent of warm rich red, thescarlet vestments of the acolytes striking a harsher note against thecrimson glow.

  Three priests in richly embroidered copes officiated at the altar,and between the rolling thunder of the organ came the sound of loudstrident voices chanting without accompaniment, while children's treblepipes shrilled out alternate versicles. The congregation consistedmostly of women, wearing veils, white or black.

  Antonia stood by a pillar near the door, enduring the heated atmosphereas long as she could, but she had to leave the church before the endof the service, followed by Sophy. Lord Dunkeld found them seatedin the piazza, where they could wait for the procession, and watchthe tributes of the pious being carried into the church by a sidedoor--huge cakes, castles and temples in ornamental pastry, baskets offruit, a dead hare, live fowls, birds in a cage, a fir tree with grapesand peaches tied to the branches, a family of white kittens mewing andstruggling in a basket.

  The train of priests and acolytes came pouring out into the sunshine,gorgeous in gold and brocade, the band playing a triumphal march. Afterthe officiating priests came a procession of men in monkish robes,some struggling under the weight of massive crosses, the rest carryingtapers that burnt pale in the vivid light; some with upright form andraven hair, others the veterans of toil, with silvery locks and darkolive faces, strong and rugged features, withered hands seamed withthe scars of labour; and following these came women of every age, fromfifteen to ninety, their heads draped with white or black veils, buttheir faces uncovered.

  Lord Dunkeld surveyed them with a critical eye. "Upon my soul, I didnot think Italy could show so much ugliness," he said.

  "Oh, but most of the girls are pretty."

  "The girls, yes--but the women! They grow out of their good looksbefore they are thirty, and are hags and witches when an Englishwoman'smature charms are at the zenith. Stay, there is a pretty roguishface--and--look, look, madam, the girl next her--the tall girl--greatHeaven, what a likeness!"

  He ran forward a few paces to get a second look at a face that hadstartled him out of his Scottish phlegm--a face that was like Antonia'sin feature and expression, though the colouring was darker and lessdelicate.

  "Did you see that tall girl with the blue bead necklace?" Dunkeld askedAntonia, excitedly.

  "I could not help seeing her, when you made such a fuss."

  "She is your living image--she ought to be your younger sister."

  "I have no sisters."

  "Oh, 'tis a chance likeness, no doubt. Such resemblances are oftenstronger than any you can find in a gallery of family portraits."

  Antonia turned to a little group of women close by, whom she hadalready questioned about the people in the procession. Did they knowthe girl in the blue necklace?

  Yes, she was Francesca Bari. She lived with her grandfather, who had alittle vineyard on the hill yonder, about a mile from the piazza wherethey were standing. The signorina had noticed her? She was accountedthe prettiest girl in the district, and she was as good as she waspretty. Her mother and father were dead, and she worked hard to keepher grandfather's house in order, and to bring up her brother andsisters.

  Dunkeld's interest in the girl began and ended in her likeness to thewoman he loved; but Antonia was keenly interested, and early nextmorning was on her way to the hill above the Lecco lake, alone andon foot, to search for the dwelling of the Baris. She was ever onthe alert to discover any trace of her mother's kindred; and it waspossible that some branch of her race had sunk to the peasant class,and that the type which sometimes marks a long line of ancestry mightbe repeated here. Antonia was not going to shut her eyes to such apossibility, however humiliating it might be. Offshoots of the greatestfamilies may be found in humble circumstances.

  She passed a few scattered houses along the crest of the hill, andsome women picking grapes in a vineyard close to the road told her theway to Bari's house. His vineyard was on the slope of the hill facingLierna.

  Less than half an hour's walk by steep and rugged paths, up and downhill, brought her to a house with bright ochre walls and dilapidatedblue shutters, standing in a patch of garden, where great goldenpumpkins sprawled between rows of cabbages and celery, under fig-treescovered with purple fruit, and apple and pear trees bent with age andthe weight of their rosy and russet crop. A straggling hedge of rosesand oleander divided the garden from the narrow lane, while beyond,the vines joined hands in green alleys along the terraced slope of thehill, sheltered by a little olive wood.

  The girl with the blue necklace was digging in the garden. Antoniacould see her across the red roses where the hedge was lowest. A childof three or four years old was sitting on a basket close by, and twoolder children were on their knees, weeding a cabbage bed. They werepoorly clad, but they looked clean, healthy, and happy.

  The girl heard the flutter of Antonia's muslin gown, and looked up,with her foot upon her spade. She wiped the perspiration from herforehead with a gaudy cotton handkerchief.

  "May I take one of your roses?" Antonia asked, smiling at her acrossthe gap in the hedge.

  "Si, si," cried Francesca, "as many as the signorina likes. There areplenty of them."

  She ran to the hedge and began to pluck the roses, in an eagerhospitality. She was dazzled by the vision of the beautiful face, theyellow hat and snowy plumes, the diamond buckle flashing in the sun,and something in the smile that puzzled her. Without being conscious ofthe likeness between the stranger's face and that one she saw everymorning unflatteringly reflected in the dusky little glass under herbedroom window, she had a feeling of familiarity with the violet eyes,the sunny smile.

  Antonia thanked her for her roses, admired her garden, questioned herabout her brother and sisters, and was at once on easy terms with her.Yes, they were motherless, and she had taken care of them ever sinceEtta, the baby, was a fortnight old. Yes, she worked hard every day;but she loved work, and when the vintage was good they were all happy.Grandfather had not been able to work for over a year; he was veryold--"_vecchio vecchio_"--and very weak.

  "I hope you have relations who help you," said Antonia, "distantrelations, perhaps, who are richer than your grandfather?"

  "No, there is no one. We had an aunt, but she is dead. She died beforeI was born. Grandfather says I am like her. It makes him cry sometimesto look at me, and to remember that he will never see her again! Shewas his favourite daughter."

  "And was your grandfather always poor--always living here, on thislittle vineyard and garden?" Antonia asked, pale, and with an intentlook in her eyes.

  Had she found them, the kindred for whom she had been looking, in thesesimple peasants, these sons and daughters of toil, so humbly born,without a history, the very off-scouring of the earth? Was this the endof her father's fairy tale, this the lowly birthplace of the Italianbride, the daughter of a noble house, who had fled with the Englishtutor, who had stooped from her high estate to make a love match?

  She remembered her father's reluctance to take her to her mother'shome, or even to tell her the locality. She remembered how he hadshuffled and prevaricated, and put off the subject, and she thoughtwith bitter shame of his falsehoods, his sophistications. Alas, why hadhe feared to tell her the truth? Would she have thought less lovinglyof her dead mother because of her humble lineage? Surely not! But shehad been fooled by lies, had thought of herself as the daughter of apatrician race, and had cherished romantic dreams of a line of soldiersand statesmen, whose ambitions and aspirations, whose courage andgenius, were in her blood.

  The dilapidated wal
ls yonder, the painted shutters rotten with age,the gaudy daub of Virgin and Child on the plastered facade, the gardenof cabbages and pumpkins, and the patch of tall Indian corn! What adisillusion! How sorry an end of her dreams!

  "Sicuro!" the girl answered, wondering at the fine lady's keen look.She had been questioned often about herself, often noticed by people ofquality, on account of her beauty; but this lady had such an earnestair. "Si, si, signorina," she said; "grandfather has always lived here.He was born in our cottage. His father was gardener to the Marchese"(the grand seigneur of the district, name understood). "And he boughtthe vineyard with his savings when he was an old man. He was a verygood gardener."

  "May I see your grandfather?"

  "Sicuro! He will be pleased to see the signorina," the girl answeredreadily, accustomed to be patronized by wandering strangers, and toreceive little gifts from them.

  Antonia followed her into the cottage. An old man was sitting in anarmchair by the hearth, where an iron pot hung over a few smoulderingsticks and a heap of grey ashes. He looked up at Antonia with eyes thatsaw all things dimly. The sunshine streamed into the room from theopen door and window; but her face was in shadow as she went towardshim with outstretched hand, Francesca explaining that the English ladywished to see him.

  The patriarch tried to rise from his chair, but Antonia stopped him,seating herself by his side.

  "I saw your grand-daughter at the festa," she said, "and I wanted tosee more of her, if I could. Can you guess why I was anxious about her,and anxious to be her friend?"

  She took off her hat, while the old man looked at her with a slowwonder, his worn-out eyes gradually realizing the lines in the splendidface.

  "I have been told that your Francesca is like me," she said. "Can yousee any resemblance?"

  "_Santo e santissimo!_ Si, si, the signorina is like Francesca, as twopeaches side by side on the wall yonder; and she is like my daughter,my Tonia, my beloved, who died more than twenty years ago. But she isnot dead to me--no, not to me. I see her face in my dreams. I hear hervoice sometimes as I wake out of sleep, and then I look round, and callher, and she is not there; and I remember that I am an old man, andthat she left me many, many years ago."

  "You had a daughter called Antonia?"

  "_Si, signorina_. It was her mother's name also. I called her Tonia.She was the handsomest girl between the two lakes. Everybody praisedher, a good girl, as industrious as she was virtuous. A good anddutiful daughter till the Englishman stole her from us."

  "Your Antonia married an Englishman?"

  "Si, signorina! 'Twas thought a fine marriage for her. He wore avelvet coat, and he called himself a gentleman; but he was only aschoolmaster, and he came to Varenna in a coach and six with a youngEnglish milord."

  "What was the tutor's name?"

  "_Non posso pronunziar' il suo nome._ Tonton, Tonton, Guilliamo."

  "Thornton! William Thornton?"

  "_Ecco!_" cried the old man, nodding assent. "We had a dairy then, mywife and I," he continued, "and the young lord and his governor usedto leave their boat and walk up the hill to get a drink of milk. Theypaid us handsomely, and we got to look for them every day, and theywould stop and talk and laugh with my two girls. The governor couldspeak Italian almost like one of us; and the young milord was trying tolearn; and they used all of them to laugh at his mistakes, and make afool of him. Well, well, 'twas a merry time for us all."

  "Did you consent to your daughter's marriage?"

  "_Chi lo sa? Forse! Non diceva ne si ne no._ He was a gentleman, andI was proud that she should marry above her station. But he told me abundle of lies. He pretended to be a rich man, and promised that hewould bring her to Italy once a year. And then he took her away, inmilord's coach, and they were married at Chiavenna, where he lied tothe priest, as he had lied to me, and swore he was a good Catholic. Hesent me the certificate of their marriage, so that I might know mydaughter was an honest woman; but he never let me see her again."

  He paused in a tearful mood.

  "Perhaps it was not his own fault that he did not keep his promise,"Antonia pleaded. "He may have been too poor to make such a journey."

  "Yes, he was as poor as Job. Tonia wrote to me sometimes, and she toldme they were very poor, and that she hated her English home, and pinedfor the garden and the vineyard, and the hills and lakes. She wasafraid she would die without ever seeing us again. Her letters werefull of sorrow. I could see her tears upon the page. And then therecame a letter from him, with a great black seal. She was dead--_Ma nonsi muove foglia che Iddio non voglia_. 'Tis not for me to complain!"

  The feeble frame was shaken by the old man's sobs. Antonia knelt on thebrick floor by his chair, and soothed him with gentle touches and softwords. She was full of tender pity; but there was the feeling that shewas stooping from her natural level to comfort a creature of a lowerrace, another order of being, with whom she could have no sympathy.

  And he was her grandfather. His blood was in her veins. From him sheinherited some of the qualities of her heart and brain: not fromstatesmen or heroes, but from a peasant, whose hands were gnarled androughened by a lifetime's drudgery, whose thoughts and desires hadnever travelled beyond his vineyard and patch of Indian corn.

  Her grandfather, living in this tumble-down old house, where the rottenshutters offered so poor a defence against foul weather, the floodsand winds of autumn and winter, where the crumbling brick floor hadsunk below the level of the soil outside: living as peasants live,and suffering all the deprivations and hardships of extreme poverty,while she, his own flesh and blood, had squandered thousands upon thecaprices of a woman of fashion. And she found him worn out with toil,old and weak, on the brink of the grave perhaps. Her wealth could dobut little for him.

  She had no doubt of his identity. The story of his daughter's marriagewas her mother's story.

  There was no room for doubt, yet she shrank with a curious restraintfrom revealing the tie that bound her to him. She was full of generouspity for a long life that had known so few of this world's joys; butthe feeling of caste was stronger than love or pity. She was ashamedof herself for feeling such bitter mortification, such a crueldisappointment. Oh, foolish pride which she had taken for an instinctof good birth! Because she was beautiful and admired, high-spirited andcourageous, she must needs believe that she sprang from a noble line,and could claim all the honour due to race. Her father had lied to her,and she had believed the flattering fable. She could not reconcileherself to the humiliating truth so far as to claim her new-foundkindred. But she was bent upon showing them all possible kindnessshort of that revelation. They were so poor, so humble, that she mightsafely play the part of benefactress. They had no pride to be crushedby her favours. She questioned the old man about his health, whilethe girl stood by the doorway listening, and the children's silveryvoices sounded in the garden outside. Had he been ill long; did hesuffer much; had he a doctor? He had been ailing a long time, but asfor suffering, well, he had pains in his limbs, the house was dampin winter, but there was more weakness than suffering. "Also the asswhen he is tired lies down in the middle of the road, and can go nofarther," he said resignedly. As for a doctor; no, he had no need ofone. The doctor would only bleed him; and he had too little blood asit was. One of his neighbours--an old woman that some folks counted awitch, but a good Catholic for all that--had given him medicine of herown making that had done him good.

  "I think a doctor would do you more good, if you would see one. Thereis a doctor at Bellagio who came to see my woman the other day when shehad a touch of fever. He seemed a clever man."

  "_Si signorina, ma senza denari non si canta messa._ Clever men want tobe paid. Your doctor would cost me the eyes of the head."

  "You shall have as much money as ever you want," answered Antonia,pulling a long netted purse from her pocket.

  The gold showed through the silken meshes, and the old man's eyesglittered with greed as he looked at it. She filled his tremulous handswith guineas, emptying both ends
of the purse into his hollowed palms.He had never seen so much gold. The strangers who came to sit under his_pergola_, and drink great bowls of new milk from the fawn-colouredcows that were his best source of income, thought themselves generousif they gave him a _scudo_ at parting: but here was a visitor fromfairyland raining gold into his hands.

  "They are English guineas, and you will gain by the exchange," shesaid, "so you can have the physician to see you every day. He will notwant to bleed you when he sees how weak you are."

  The old man shook his head doubtfully. They were so ready with thelancet, those doctors! His eyes were fixed on the guineas, as he triedto reckon them. The coins lay in too close a heap to be counted easily.

  He broke into a rapture of gratitude, invoking every saint in thecalendar, and Antonia shivered with pain at the exaggeration of hisacknowledgments. He thanked her as a wayside beggar would have done.His benedictions were the same as the professional mendicants, themaimed and halt and blind, gave her when she dropped a coin into abasket or a hat. He belonged to the race which is accustomed to takingfavours from strangers. He belonged to the sons of bondage, poverty'shereditary slaves.

  She appealed to Francesca.

  "Would it not be better for your grandfather if he lived at Bellagio,where he would have a comfortable house in a street, and plenty ofneighbours?" she asked.

  "I don't think he would like to leave the vineyard, Signorina; thoughit would be very pleasant to live in the town," answered Francesca.

  Her dark eyes sparkled at the thought. It was lonely on the hill,where she had only the children to talk to, and her grandfather, whoseconversation was one long lamentation.

  The old man looked up with a scared expression.

  "_Ohime! Non posso!_" he exclaimed, "I could not leave the villino. Ishall die as I have lived, in the villino!"

  "Well, you must do what is best pleasing to yourself," Antonia said."All I desire is that you should be happy, and enjoy every comfort thatmoney can buy."

  She bent down and kissed the sunburnt forehead, so wrinkled andweather-beaten after the long life of toil. She asked Francesca to walka little way with her; and they went out into the lane together.

  "Your house looks comfortless even in sunshine," Antonia said. "It mustbe worse in winter!"

  "_Si, signorina._ It is very cold in bad weather, but grandfather lovesthe villino."

  "You might get a carpenter to mend the windows and put new hinges onthe shutters. They look as if they would hardly shut."

  "Indeed, signorina, 'tis long since our shutters have been shut.Grandfather is too poor to pay a carpenter. Nothing in the house hasbeen mended since I can remember."

  "But you have your cows and your vineyard. How is it that he is sopoor?"

  The girl shrugged her shoulders. She knew nothing.

  "Is it you who keeps the purse?"

  "No, no, _signorina, non so niente_. Grandfather gives me money to paythe baker----"

  "And the butcher?"

  "We do not buy meat. I kill a fowl sometimes, or a rabbit; but for themost part we have cabbage soup and polenta."

  "Well, you will have plenty of money in future. I shall see to that;and you must take care that your grandfather has good food every day,and a doctor when he is ailing, and warm blankets for winter. I wantyou both to be happy and well cared for. And you must get a man to digin the garden and carry water for you. I don't like to see a girl workas you do."

  Francesca stared at the beautiful lady in open wonder. She wasdoubtless mad as a March hare, la Poverina; but what a delightful formher madness had taken. It might be that the Blessed Virgin had inspiredthis madness, and sent this lovely lunatic wandering from house tohouse among the deserving poor, scattering gold wherever she found wantand piety. It was almost a miracle. Indeed, who could be sure thatthis benign lady was not the Blessed One herself, who could appear inany manner she pleased, even arrayed in the latest fashion of plumedhats and India muslin _negligees?_

  Antonia left the girl a little way from the villino, and walked slowlydown the hill to Bellagio, deep in thought. Alas, alas, to have foundher mother's kindred, and to feel no thrill of love, no yearning totake them to her heart, only the same kind of pity she had felt forthose poor wretches in Lambeth Marsh, only an eager desire to maketheir lot happier, to give them all good things that money can buy.

  "Should I grow to love that old man if I knew him better?" shewondered. "Is there some dormant affection in my heart, some hereditarylove that needs but to be warmed into life by time and custom? Godknows what I am made of. I do not feel as if I could ever care for thatpoor old man as grandfathers are cared for. My mother's father, and heloved her dearly! It is base ingratitude in me not to love him."

  She recalled the greedy look that came into the withered old faceat sight of the gold. A painter need have asked no better model forHarpagon. She would have given much not to have seen that look.

  She would visit them often, she thought, and would win him to softermoods. She would question him about her mother's girlhood, beguile himinto fond memories of the long-lost daughter, memories of his youngerdays, before grinding poverty had made him so eager for gold. She wouldmake herself familiar with Bari and his granddaughter, find out alltheir wants, all their desires, and provide for the welfare of the oldlife that was waning, and the young life with a long future before it.She would make age and youth happy, if it were possible. But she wouldnot tell them of the relationship that made it her duty to care forthem. She would let them remember her as the eccentric stranger, whohad found them in poverty, and left them in easy circumstances; thebenefactress dropped from the clouds.

  To what end should she tell them of kinship if she could not givethem a kinswoman's love? And she could not. The girl was a beautifulcreature, kindly, gentle, caressing; but she was a peasant, a peasantwhose thoughts had never travelled beyond the narrow circle of herhills, whose rough knuckles and thick fingers told of years of toil,who had not one feeling in common with the cousin bred upon books,and plunged in the morning of youth into the most enlightened societyin Christendom, the London of Walpoles and Herveys, Carterets and St.Johns, Pitts and Foxes.

  She would not tell them. She could not imagine her lips framing thewords. She could not say to Francesca, "We are first cousins, the nextthing to sisters." But she could make them happy. That was possible.She could take all needful measures to provide them with a substantialincome; a competence which should enable them to rebuild the rotten oldvilla, and spend the rest of their days in ease and plenty.

  Lord Dunkeld called on her in the evening, and took a dish of tea withthe two ladies in their garden betwixt sunset and moonrise. He foundAntonia looking pale and tired.

  "She started on one of her solitary rambles early this morning," Sophysaid; "as if any one ought to walk in this climate, and she was aswhite as her muslin gown when she came home. She had much better haveidled with me in the boat."

  "I did not go far," Antonia said, "but I found some interestingpeople--only peasants. The girl your lordship noticed yesterday in theprocession."

  "The girl who is so like you?" exclaimed Dunkeld. "I thought yourladyship was a stranger to at least one of the deadly sins, and knew notouch of vanity. But I find you are mortal, and that you had a fancy tosee a face like your own."

  "Yes, I had a fancy to see the girl. And now I want to help her, if Ican. She is desperately poor."

  "Is anybody poor in Italy? I have always thought that Italian peasantslive upon sunshine and a few ripe figs, and have no use for money."

  "They are very poor. The grandfather is old, and ailing. Can you findme an honest lawyer here, or at Varenna?"

  "For your ladyship I would attempt miracles. I will do my best."

  "And as quickly as you can, my lord, for I want to go back to England."

  "Grant me the felicity of escorting you when you go, and make me yourslave in the mean time; though, as I am always that, madam, 'tis aone-sided bargain."

  "Oh, pray come in ou
r coach with us, my lord," cried Sophy. "I was in apanic all the way here, on account of the brigands."

  "Heavens! Was your coach attacked?"

  "No, no, sir," said Antonia, laughing. "The brigands came no nearerthan a vague rumour that some of their calling had been heard of aboveAndermatt."

  "But who knows what may happen when we are going home, now that thedays are so much shorter?" protested Sophy.

  "If one strong arm and a pair of pistols can help you, Miss Potter----"

  "Oh, I shall feel ever so much safer with your lordship in our coach. Iknow if those wretches came--with black masks, perhaps--Giuseppe wouldrun away."

  Giuseppe was the Italian footman, whom Sophy suspected of being apoor-spirited creature, in spite of a figure which would have delightedthe late King of Prussia.

  Antonia went to the villino on the following afternoon, and beingunable to shake off Lord Dunkeld, allowed him to accompany her. Sheliked his conversation, which diverted her thoughts from broodingupon the past, and on George Stobart's peril in the wild world acrossthe Atlantic. He filled the place of that brilliant society which hadbeen her anodyne for every grief; and she was grateful to him for asteadfastness in friendship which promised to last for a lifetime. Hiscolder temperament had allowed him to put off the lover and assume thefriend. He had been strong as a granite pillar where George Stobart hadproved a broken reed.

  They found the girl tying up the vine branches in a long berceau, andthe old man sitting by the smouldering ashes as he had sat yesterday,in a monotony of idleness. The windows had not been mended, and theshutters still hung forlornly upon broken hinges.

  Antonia asked the girl if she had not been able to find a carpenter todo the work.

  "Grandfather would not let a carpenter come. He is afraid of the noise."

  "And when bad weather comes the rain will come in."

  "_Si, signorina;_ the rain always comes in."

  "And your broken shutters cannot keep out the cold winds."

  "No, signorina; the wind almost blows grandfather out of his chairsometimes."

  "Then he really ought to let a carpenter come."

  The old man was listening intently, and Dunkeld was watching his face.

  "They are brigands, those carpenters," he said. "'Tis a waste of moneyto employ them. I don't mind the wind, signorina. Francia can hang up acurtain."

  "Oh, grandfather, the curtain is an old rag! And the signorina gave youmoney to pay the carpenter."

  "_Andiamo adagio, carissima._ I am not going to waste the signorina'smoney on idlers and cheats, nor yet upon doctors. I hate doctors! Theyare knaves, bloodthirsty rogues that want to be paid for sticking aknife into a man as if he were a pig!"

  Antonia did not argue the point, and left the old man after a fewkindly words. She was disgusted at his obstinacy, which made it so harda matter to improve his circumstances. She walked some way in silence,Dunkeld at her side.

  "I fear your new _protege_ is a troublesome subject," he said, "andthat you will find a difficulty in helping him."

  "I cannot understand his objection to having that wretched old barnmade wind and weather tight."

  "I can. The man is a miser. You have given him money, and he wants tokeep it, to hide it under his mattress, perhaps, and gloat over it inthe dead of the night. The miser has a keener joy in the touch of aguinea than in any indulgence of meat or drink, warmth and comfort,that money can buy."

  "I fear your lordship has guessed the riddle," Antonia answered,wounded to the quick. "I gave him all the gold in my purse yesterday.'Twas at least twenty guineas. Well, I must take other means. I willsend a carpenter to do all the work that is wanted, and take theBellagio doctor to the villino to-morrow morning."

  "Will your ladyship be offended if I presume to advise?"

  "Offended! I shall think you vastly kind."

  "Leave these people alone. The old man is unworthy of your protection.The girl is happy in her present condition. Your bounty will butadminister to her grandfather's avarice, and will not better her life."

  "But I must help them--I must, I must," Antonia protested. "It is myduty. I cannot let them suffer the ills of poverty while I am rich. Imust find some way to make their lives easy."

  Dunkeld wondered at her vehemence, and pursued the argument no further.This passion of charity was but an instinct of her generous nature, thedesire to share fortune's gifts with the unfortunate.

  She returned from this second visit dispirited and unhappy. Was shedoomed never to be able to esteem those whom she was bound to love?She had loved her father fondly, though she had known him unprincipledand shifty; but what affection could she feel for this old man againstwhom her class instinct revolted, unless she could find in him humblevirtues that could atone for humble birth? And she found him sordid,untruthful, avaricious.

  She called on the local doctor next morning, and went with him to thevillino, where he diagnosed the old man's ailments as only old age, theweakness induced by poor food, and the rheumatic symptoms that were thenatural result of living in a draughty house. He recommended warmth anda generous diet, and promised to call once a week through the comingwinter, his fee for each visit being something less than an Englishshilling.

  After he had gone Antonia sat in the garden with Baptisto Bari andhis granddaughter for an hour. She had his chair carried into thesunshine, and out of the way of the noise, while a couple of workmenmended the windows and shutters. She had found a builder in Bellagio,and had instructed him to do all that could be done to make the housecomfortable before winter. He was to get the work done with the leastpossible inconvenience to the family.

  Sitting in the quiet garden, while Francesca gathered beans for thesoup, and while the children sprawled in the sun, playing with sometoys Antonia had brought them, Bari was easily lured into talkingof the past, and of the daughter he had loved. All that was best inhis nature revealed itself when he talked of his sorrow; and Antoniathought that the miser's despicable passion had only grown upon himafter the loss that had, perhaps, blighted his life. And then, when hewas an old man, death had taken his remaining daughter; and he had beenleft, lonely and heart-broken, with his orphan grandchildren. He hadbegun to scrape and pinch for their support, most likely; and then themiser's insane love of money had grown upon him, like some insidiousdisease.

  Antonia tried to interest him, and to make excuses for him, and shespoke to him very plainly upon the money question. She appealed even tohis selfishness.

  "When I give you money, it is that you may have all the good thingsthat money can buy," she said; "good wine and strengthening food,warm clothes, a comfortable bed. What is the use of a few guineas ina cracked teacup, or hidden in a corner of your mattress?"--Baptistoalmost jumped out of his chair, and she knew she had hit upon the placeof his treasure. "What is the use of hoarding money that other peoplewill spend and waste, perhaps, when you are dead?"

  "No, no, she will not waste it. _Che Diavolo!_ She will give me ahandsome funeral, and spend all the rest on masses for the good of mysoul. That is what she will have to do."

  "You need not save money for that. If you live comfortably your lifewill be prolonged, most likely; and I promise that you shall have ahandsome funeral, and the--the masses."

  She went again next day, and on the day after, always alone; and theold man became more and more at his ease with her; but all that she didwas done for duty's sake, and she found it harder work to talk to himthan it had been to talk with poor dying Sally Dormer, by whose bedsideshe had spent many quiet hours. The abyss between them was wider. Butshe felt more affectionately towards Francesca, who adored her almostas if she were indeed the celestial lady whose miraculous presenceevery good Catholic is prepared to meet at any solemn crisis of life.

  Antonia did not rest till, with the assistance of a banker and lawyerat Varenna, she had settled an income of three hundred pounds a yearupon Baptisto, with reversion to his grandchildren, she herself actingas trustee in conjunction with the banker, who was partne
r in anold-established banking house at Milan, of which the Varenna bank--in apavilion in an angle of a garden wall--was a branch.

  This done, her mind was at ease, and she prepared for her journey toEngland. She would return, as she had come, by the Low Countries,avoiding France on account of the war.

  Lord Dunkeld had advised and assisted her in making the settlement onthe Baris, but she knew that he thought her foolish and quixotic in herdetermination to provide for this particular family.

  "I could find you a score of claimants for your bounty, far morepathetic cases than Baptisto, if you are so set upon playing the goodangel," he said. "'Tis a mercy you do not want to provide for the wholepauper population upon the same magnificent scale. Three hundred ayear for an Italian peasant! But a woman's charity is ever a romanticimpulse; and one can but admire her tenderness, though one may questionher discretion."

  "I may have a reason you cannot fathom," Antonia said gravely.

  "Oh, 'tis the heart moves you to this act, not the reason! This worldwould be happier if all women were as unreasonable."

  She despised herself for suppressing the motive of her bounty. To bepraised for generosity, while she was ashamed to acknowledge her ownkindred, ashamed of her own lowly origin! What could be meaner or moredegrading? But she thought of Dunkeld's thousand years' pedigree, thepride of birth, the instinct of race, which he had so often revealedunconsciously in their familiar talk; and it was difficult to sink herown pride before so proud a man.

  The last day came, and he insisted on accompanying her in her farewellvisit. She had given him the privileges of a trusted friend, and hadno excuse for refusing his company.

  She told Baptisto Bari what she had done for him.

  "You will have seventy-five pounds paid you every quarter," shesaid; "and all you have to do is to spend your money freely, and letFrancesca buy everything that is wanted for you, and the children, andherself. I shall come back next year, and I shall be very sorry andvery angry if I do not find you living in comfort, and the villinolooking as handsome as a nobleman's villa."

  The old man protested his gratitude, with tears. Yes, he would spendhis money. He had been spending it. See, there was the magnificent newcurtain; and he had a pillow for his bed; and a barrel of oil for thelamp. They had the lamp lighted every night. And he had coffee--a dishof coffee on Sunday--and they had been drinking their milk, and makingbutter for themselves, instead of selling all the milk to the _negozio_in Bellagio. Indeed, he had discovered that money was a very usefulthing when one spent it; though it was also useful to keep it againstthe day of misfortune or death.

  "True, m'amico; but it is bad economy to keep your money under yourpillow, and let your house fall over your ears for want of mending,"answered Antonia; and then she bade him good-bye--good-bye tillnext year, and bent down to kiss the withered forehead, above whitepent-house eyebrows.

  The keen old eyes clouded over with tears as her lips touched him, andthe tremulous old hands were joined in prayer that God and the Saintsmight reward her piety.

  She opened her arms to Francesca, who fell upon her breast, sobbing.

  "Ah, sweetest lady, had the poor ever such a friend, ever such abenefactor? Heaven sent you to us. We pray for you night and day, foryour happiness on earth, for your soul's bliss in heaven," cried thegirl, in her melodious Italian.

  Antonia could scarcely drag herself away from the clinging arms, thetears and benedictions; but she left Francesca at the garden gate,and amid all those tears and kisses had not revealed herself to herkindred.

  She crossed the hill in silence, Dunkeld at her side, watching herthoughtful countenance, and perplexed by its almost tragic gloom.

  "You are a wonderful woman," he said lightly, by-and-by, to break thespell of silence. "You take these Italian peasants to your heart as ifthey were your own flesh and blood. Is it the Italian blood in yourveins that opens your heart to beings of so different a race?"

  "Perhaps."

  "I could understand your letting the girl hug you--a creature solovely, and in the bloom and freshness of youth. But that wrinkled oldmiser! Well, 'twas a divine charity that moved you to squander a kissupon that parchment brow."

  Antonia turned to him in a sudden tumult of feeling, remorse, shame,self-disparagement.

  "Oh, stop, stop!" she cried. "Your words scald me like molten lead.Divine charity! Why, I am the most despicable of women. I hate myselffor my paltry pride. I can bear the shame of it no longer. 'Twill beyour lordship's turn to scorn me as I scorn myself. That old man ismy mother's father. I came to Italy to hunt for her kindred, to findin what palace she was reared, from what princely race I inherited myhaughty spirit. And a chance, the chance likeness between Francescaand me, resulted in the discovery that I came of a long line ofpeasants, servants, the tillers of the ground, the race that lives bysubmissive toil, that has never known independence. And I was ashamedof them--bitterly ashamed. It was anguish to me to know that I sprangfrom that humble stock, most of all when I thought of you, yourwarriors, and statesmen, bishops, judges--all the long line of rulersand master minds, stretching back into the dark night of history, partof yourself; for if they had never lived you could not be what you are."

  "Oh, madam, you own a more noble lineage than Scottish Thanes can boastof. The seaborn Venus had no ancestors, but was queen of the earth bythe divine right of beauty. You are a daughter of the gods, and mayeasily dispense with a parchment pedigree."

  "Oh, pray, sir, no idle compliments! I would rather suffer yourcontempt than your mocking praise. I can scarcely be more despicable inyour esteem than I am in my own."

  "I could never think ill of you, my sweet friend; never doubt thenobility of your heart and mind. The test has been a severe one; for toa woman the death of a romantic dream means much; but the gold ringstrue. You had a right to keep this secret from me if you pleased."

  "And from them?"

  "That is a nicer question. I doubt it is your duty to make them happierby the knowledge that they have a legitimate claim to your bounty. Ithink you would do well to disclose your relationship to them beforeyou leave Italy. The old man may not live till your return; and thethought that pride had come between you and one so near in blood mightbe a lasting regret."

  "Yes, yes, your lordship is right. I will see them again this evening.I will tell my grandfather who and what I am. Yes, it was odious of meto play the Lady Bountiful, to let him praise me for generosity--me,his daughter's child. Sure I am glad I made my confession to you, fornow I know that you are my true friend."

  "I will never advise you ill, if I can help it, madam," he said,stooping to kiss her hand. "And doubt not that you can trust me withevery secret of your heart and mind, for there can exist no feeling orthought in either that is not common to generous natures."

  * * * * *

  Lady Kilrush spent the sunset hour with her kindred, and was touchedby the old man's delight when he clasped to his heart the child ofthat daughter he had loved and mourned. She knelt beside him withuncovered head as she told him the story of her childhood, her lovefor the mother she had lost before memory began. He turned her face tothe sunset glow, and gazed at her with eyes drowned in tears. He wasno longer the money-grubber, keenly expectant of a stranger's bounty.The whole nature of the man seemed changed by the awakening of anunforgotten love.

  "Yes, it is Tonia's face," he cried. "I knew you were beautiful; I knewyou were like her; but not how like. Your brow has the same lines, yourlips have the same curves. Yes, now, as you smile at me, I see mybeloved one again."

  There was nothing sordid or vulgar in the peasant now. His countenanceshone with the pure light of love, and Antonia's heart went out to himwith some touch of filial affection.

  Before they parted he gave her a letter--the ink dim with age--hermother's last letter, written from the Lincolnshire homestead where shedied; and Antonia read of the love that had hung over her cradle, thattender maternal love she had been fated never to know.


  She deferred her journey for a few days, at her grandfather's entreaty,and spent many hours at the villino. She encouraged Baptisto andFrancesca to talk to her of all the details of their lives. She drewnearer to them in thought and feeling, and made new plans for theirhappiness, promising to come to Bellagio every autumn, and offering tobuild them a new house next year at the other end of their garden wherethe view was finer. But the old man protested that the villino wouldlast his time, and that he would never like any house as well.

  "Then the new house must be built for Francesca when she marries,"Antonia told him gaily. "We will wait till she has a suitor she loves."

 

‹ Prev Next ›