Delphi Complete Works of Sheridan Le Fanu

by J. Sheridan le Fanu

  The household paraded for welcome was not certainly very brilliant. Amid the riot the trunks were deliberately put down by our attendant, who kept shouting to the old man at the door, and to the dogs in turn; and the old man was talking and pointing stiffly and tremulously, but I could not hear what he said.

  ‘Was it possible — could that mean-looking old man be Uncle Silas?’

  The idea stunned me; but I almost instantly perceived that he was much too small, and I was relieved, and even grateful. It was certainly an odd mode of procedure to devote primary attention to the trunks and boxes, leaving the travellers still shut up in the carriage, of which they were by this time pretty well tired. I was not sorry for the reprieve, however: being nervous about first impressions, and willing to defer mine, I sat shyly back, peeping at the candle and moonlight picture before me, myself unseen.

  ‘Will you tell — yes or no — is my cousin in the coach?’ screamed the plump young lady, stamping her stout black boot, in a momentary lull.

  Yes, I was there, sure.

  ‘And why the puck don’t you let her out, you stupe, you?’

  ‘Run down, Giblets, you never do nout without driving, and let Cousin Maud out. You’re very welcome to Bartram.’ This greeting was screamed at an amazing pitch, and repeated before I had time to drop the window, and say ‘thank you.’ ‘I’d a let you out myself — there’s a good dog, you would na’ bite Cousin’ (the parenthesis was to a huge mastiff, who thrust himself beside her, by this time quite pacified)— ‘only I daren’t go down the steps, for the governor said I shouldn’t.’

  The venerable person who went by the name of Giblets had by this time opened the carriage door, and our courier, or ‘boots’ — he looked more like the latter functionary — had lowered the steps, and in greater trepidation than I experienced when in after-days I was presented to my sovereign, I glided down, to offer myself to the greeting and inspection of the plain-spoken young lady who stood at the top of the steps to receive me.

  She welcomed me with a hug and a hearty buss, as she called that salutation, on each cheek, and pulled me into the hall, and was evidently glad to see me.

  ‘And you’re tired a bit, I warrant; and who’s the old ‘un, who?’ she asked eagerly, in a stage whisper, which made my ear numb for five minutes after. ‘Oh, oh, the maid! and a precious old ‘un — ha, ha, ha! But lawk! how grand she is, with her black silk, cloak and crape, and I only in twilled cotton, and rotten old Coburg for Sundays. Odds! it’s a shame; but you’ll be tired, you will. It’s a smartish pull, they do say, from Knowl. I know a spell of it, only so far as the “Cat and Fiddle,” near the Lunnon-road. Come up, will you? Would you like to come in first and talk a bit wi’ the governor? Father, you know, he’s a bit silly, he is, this while.’ I found that the phrase meant only bodily infirmity. ‘He took a pain o’ Friday, newralgie — something or other he calls it — rheumatics it is when it takes old “Giblets” there; and he’s sitting in his own room; or maybe you’d like better to come to your bedroom first, for it is dirty work travelling, they do say.’

  Yes; I preferred the preliminary adjustment. Mary Quince was standing behind me; and as my voluble kinswoman talked on, we had each ample time and opportunity to observe the personnel of the other; and she made no scruple of letting me perceive that she was improving it, for she stared me full in the face, taking in evidently feature after feature; and she felt the material of my mantle pretty carefully between her finger and thumb, and manually examined my chain and trinkets, and picked up my hand as she might a glove, to con over my rings.

  I can’t say, of course, exactly what impression I may have produced on her. But in my cousin Milly I saw a girl who looked younger than her years, plump, but with a slender waist, with light hair, lighter than mine, and very blue eyes, rather round; on the whole very good-looking. She had an odd swaggering walk, a toss of her head, and a saucy and imperious, but rather goodnatured and honest countenance. She talked rather loud, with a good ringing voice, and a boisterous laugh when it came.

  If I was behind the fashion, what would Cousin Monica have thought of her? She was arrayed, as she had stated, in black twilled cotton expressive of her affliction; but it was made almost as short in the skirt as that of the prints of the Bavarian broom girls. She had white cotton stockings, and a pair of black leather boots, with leather buttons, and, for a lady, prodigiously thick soles, which reminded me of the navvy boots I had so often admired in Punch. I must add that the hands with which she assisted her scrutiny of my dress, though pretty, were very much sunburnt indeed.

  ‘And what’s her name?’ she demanded, nodding to Mary Quince, who was gazing on her awfully, with round eyes, as an inland spinster might upon a whale beheld for the first time.

  Mary courtesied, and I answered.

  ‘Mary Quince,’ she repeated. ‘You’re welcome, Quince. What shall I call her? I’ve a name for all o’ them. Old Giles there, is Giblets. He did not like it first, but he answers quick enough now; and Old Lucy Wyat there,’ nodding toward the old woman, ‘is Lucia de l’Amour.’ A slightly erroneous reading of Lammermoor, for my cousin sometimes made mistakes, and was not much versed in the Italian opera. ‘You know it’s a play, and I call her L’Amour for shortness;’ and she laughed hilariously, and I could not forbear joining; and, winking at me, she called aloud, ‘L’Amour.’

  To which the crone, with a high-cauled cap, resembling Mother Hubbard, responded with a courtesy and ‘Yes,’m.’

  ‘Are all the trunks and boxes took up?’

  They were.

  ‘Well, we’ll come now; and what shall I call you, Quince? Let me see.’

  ‘According to your pleasure, Miss,’ answered Mary, with dignity, and a dry courtesy.

  ‘Why, you’re as hoarse as a frog, Quince. We’ll call you Quinzy for the present. That’ll do. Come along, Quinzy.’

  So my Cousin Milly took me under the arm, and pulled me forward; but as we ascended, she let me go, leaning back to make inspection of my attire from a new point of view.

  ‘Hallo, cousin,’ she cried, giving my dress a smack with her open hand. ‘What a plague do you want of all that bustle; you’ll leave it behind, lass, the first bush you jump over.’

  I was a good deal astounded. I was also very near laughing, for there was a sort of importance in her plump countenance, and an indescribable grotesqueness in the fashion of her garments, which heightened the outlandishness of her talk, in a way which I cannot at all describe.

  What palatial wide stairs those were which we ascended, with their prodigious carved banisters of oak, and each huge pillar on the landing-place crowned with a shield and carved heraldic supporters; florid oak panelling covered the walls. But of the house I could form no estimate, for Uncle Silas’s housekeeping did not provide light for hall and passages, and we were dependent on the glimmer of a single candle; but there would be quite enough of this kind of exploration in the daylight.

  So along dark oak flooring we advanced to my room, and I had now an opportunity of admiring, at my leisure, the lordly proportions of the building. Two great windows, with dark and tarnished curtains, rose half as high again as the windows of Knowl; and yet Knowl, in its own style, is a fine house. The door-frames, like the window-frames, were richly carved; the fireplace was in the same massive style, and the mantelpiece projected with a mass of very rich carving. On the whole I was surprised. I had never slept in so noble a room before.

  The furniture, I must confess, was by no means on a par with the architectural pretensions of the apartment. A French bed, a piece of carpet about three yards square, a small table, two chairs, a toilet table — no wardrobe — no chest of drawers. The furniture painted white, and of the light and diminutive kind, was particularly ill adapted to the scale and style of the apartment, one end only of which it occupied, and that but sparsely, leaving the rest of the chamber in the nakedness of a stately desolation. My cousin Milly ran away to report progress to ‘the Governor,’ as she termed
Uncle Silas.

  ‘Well, Miss Maud, I never did expect to see the like o’ that!’ exclaimed honest Mary Quince, ‘Did you ever see such a young lady? She’s no more like one o’ the family than I am. Law bless us! and what’s she dressed like? Well, well, well!’ And Mary, with a rueful shake of her head, clicked her tongue pathetically to the back of her teeth, while I could not forbear laughing.

  ‘And such a scrap o’ furniture! Well, well, well!’ and the same ticking of the tongue followed.

  But, in a few minutes, back came Cousin Milly, and, with a barbarous sort of curiosity, assisted in unpacking my trunks, and stowing away the treasures, on which she ventured a variety of admiring criticisms, in the presses which, like cupboards, filled recesses in the walls, with great oak doors, the keys of which were in them.

  As I was making my hurried toilet, she entertained me now and then with more strictly personal criticisms.

  ‘Your hair’s a shade darker than mine — it’s none the better o’ that though — is it? Mine’s said to be the right shade. I don’t know — what do you say?’

  I conceded the point with a good grace.

  ‘I wish my hands was as white though — you do lick me there; but it’s all gloves, and I never could abide ‘em. I think I’ll try though — they are very white, sure.’

  ‘I wonder which is the prettiest, you or me? I don’t know, I’m sure — which do you think?’

  I laughed outright at this challenge, and she blushed a little, and for the first time seemed for a moment a little shy.

  ‘Well, you are a half an inch longer than me, I think — don’t you?’

  I was fully an inch taller, so I had no difficulty in making the proposed admission.

  ‘Well, you do look handsome! doesn’t she, Quinzy, lass? but your frock comes down almost to your heels — it does.’

  And she glanced from mine to hers, and made a little kick up with the heel of the navvy boot to assist her in measuring the comparative distance.

  ‘Maybe mine’s a thought too short?’ she suggested. ‘Who’s there? Oh! it’s you, is it?’ she cried as Mother Hubbard appeared at the door. ‘Come in, L’Amour — don’t you know, lass, you’re always welcome?’

  She had come to let us know that Uncle Silas would be happy to see me whenever I was ready; and that my cousin Millicent would conduct me to the room where he awaited me.

  In an instant all the comic sensations awakened by my singular cousin’s eccentricities vanished, and I was thrilled with awe. I was about to see in the flesh — faded, broken, aged, but still identical — that being who had been the vision and the problem of so many years of my short life.

  CHAPTER XXXII

  UNCLE SILAS

  I thought my odd cousin was also impressed with a kind of awe, though different in degree from mine, for a shade overcast her face, and she was silent as we walked side by side along the gallery, accompanied by the crone who carried the candle which lighted us to the door of that apartment which I may call Uncle Silas’s presence chamber.

  Milly whispered to me as we approached —

  ‘Mind how you make a noise; the governor’s as sharp as a weasel, and nothing vexes him like that.’

  She was herself toppling along on tiptoe. We paused at a door near the head of the great staircase, and L’Amour knocked timidly with her rheumatic knuckles.

  A voice, clear and penetrating, from within summoned us to enter. The old woman opened the door, and the next moment I was in the presence of Uncle Silas.

  At the far end of a handsome wainscoted room, near the hearth in which a low fire was burning, beside a small table on which stood four waxlights, in tall silver candlesticks, sat a singular-looking old man.

  The dark wainscoting behind him, and the vastness of the room, in the remoter parts of which the light which fell strongly upon his face and figure expended itself with hardly any effect, exhibited him with the forcible and strange relief of a finely painted Dutch portrait. For some time I saw nothing but him.

  A face like marble, with a fearful monumental look, and, for an old man, singularly vivid strange eyes, the singularity of which rather grew upon me as I looked; for his eyebrows were still black, though his hair descended from his temples in long locks of the purest silver and fine as silk, nearly to his shoulders.

  He rose, tall and slight, a little stooped, all in black, with an ample black velvet tunic, which was rather a gown than a coat, with loose sleeves, showing his snowy shirt some way up the arm, and a pair of wrist buttons, then quite out of fashion, which glimmered aristocratically with diamonds.

  I know I can’t convey in words an idea of this apparition, drawn as it seemed in black and white, venerable, bloodless, fiery-eyed, with its singular look of power, and an expression so bewildering — was it derision, or anguish, or cruelty, or patience?

  The wild eyes of this strange old man were fixed upon me as he rose; an habitual contraction, which in certain lights took the character of a scowl, did not relax as he advanced toward me with his thin-lipped smile. He said something in his clear, gentle, but cold voice, the import of which I was too much agitated to catch, and he took both my hands in his, welcomed me with a courtly grace which belonged to another age, and led me affectionately, with many inquiries which I only half comprehended, to a chair near his own.

  ‘I need not introduce my daughter; she has saved me that mortification. You’ll find her, I believe, goodnatured and affectionate; au reste, I fear a very rustic Miranda, and fitted rather for the society of Caliban than of a sick old Prospero. Is it not so, Millicent?’

  The old man paused sarcastically for an answer, with his eyes fixed severely on my odd cousin, who blushed and looked uneasily to me for a hint.

  ‘I don’t know who they be — neither one nor t’other.’

  ‘Very good, my dear,’ he replied, with a little mocking bow. ‘You see, my dear Maud, what a Shakespearean you have got for a cousin. It’s plain, however, she has made acquaintance with some of our dramatists: she has studied the rôle of Miss Hoyden so perfectly.’

  It was not a reasonable peculiarity of my uncle that he resented, with a good deal of playful acrimony, my poor cousin’s want of education, for which, if he were not to blame, certainly neither was she.

  ‘You see her, poor thing, a result of all the combined disadvantages of want of refined education, refined companionship, and, I fear, naturally, of refined tastes; but a sojourn at a good French conventual school will do wonders, and I hope to manage by-and-by. In the meantime we jest at our misfortunes, and love one another, I hope, cordially.’

  He extended his thin, white hand with a chilly smile towards Milly, who bounced up, and took it with a frightened look; and he repeated, holding her hand rather slightly I thought, ‘Yes, I hope, very cordially,’ and then turning again to me, he put it over the arm of his chair, and let it go, as a man might drop something he did not want from a carriage window.

  Having made this apology for poor Milly, who was plainly bewildered, he passed on, to her and my relief, to other topics, every now and then expressing his fears that I was fatigued, and his anxiety that I should partake of some supper or tea; but these solicitudes somehow seemed to escape his remembrance almost as soon as uttered; and he maintained the conversation, which soon degenerated into a close, and to me a painful examination, respecting my dear father’s illness and its symptoms, upon which I could give no information, and his habits, upon which I could.

  Perhaps he fancied that there might be some family predisposition to the organic disease of which his brother died, and that his questions were directed rather to the prolonging of his own life than to the better understanding of my dear father’s death.

  How little was there left to this old man to make life desirable, and yet how keenly, I afterwards found, he clung to it. Have we not all of us seen those to whom life was not only undesirable, but positively painful — a mere series of bodily torments, yet hold to it with a desperate and pitiable tenacity
— old children or young, it is all the same.

  See how a sleepy child will put off the inevitable departure for bed. The little creature’s eyes blink and stare, and it needs constant jogging to prevent his nodding off into the slumber which nature craves. His waking is a pain; he is quite worn out, and peevish, and stupid, and yet he implores a respite, and deprecates repose, and vows he is not sleepy, even to the moment when his mother takes him in her arms, and carries him, in a sweet slumber, to the nursery. So it is with us old children of earth and the great sleep of death, and nature our kind mother. Just so reluctantly we part with consciousness, the picture is, even to the last, so interesting; the bird in the hand, though sick and moulting, so inestimably better than all the brilliant tenants of the bush. We sit up, yawning, and blinking, and stupid, the whole scene swimming before us, and the stories and music humming off into the sound of distant winds and waters. It is not time yet; we are not fatigued; we are good for another hour still, and so protesting against bed, we falter and drop into the dreamless sleep which nature assigns to fatigue and satiety.

  He then spoke a little eulogy of his brother, very polished, and, indeed, in a kind of way, eloquent. He possessed in a high degree that accomplishment, too little cultivated, I think, by the present generation, of expressing himself with perfect precision and fluency. There was, too, a good deal of slight illustrative quotation, and a sprinkling of French flowers, over his conversation, which gave to it a character at once elegant and artificial. It was all easy, light, and pointed, and being quite new to me, had a wonderful fascination.