Complete Works of Sheridan Le Fanu (Illustrated)

by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu

  Now William got back into his bed. For the first time in his life he had experienced a paroxysm of that wild fear with which it had been so often his delight to trifle. He heard the clock at the stairhead strike hour after hour, and at last, after having experienced every stage in the subsidence of such horrors, fairly overcome by fatigue, he sunk to sleep.

  How welcome and how beautiful shone the morning! Slanting by his window, the sunbeam touched the quivering jessamine leaves, and the clustering roses, and in the dewy air he heard the chirp and whistle of the happy birds. He threw up his window and breathed the perfumed air, and welcomed all the pleasant sounds of morning in that pleasant season.

  “The cock he crew, Away then flew The fiends from the church-door.”

  And so the uncomfortable and odious shadows of the night winged their foul flight before these cheerful influences, and William Maubray, though he felt the want of his accustomed sleep, ran down the well-known stairs, and heard with a happy heart from Winnie Dobbs that his kind old aunt was ever so much better.

  Doctor Drake had withdrawn from his uncomfortable bivouac, carrying with him his nightcap and slippers, and hastening to his toilet in the pleasant town of Saxton, where, no doubt, Miss Letty cross-questioned him minutely upon the occurrences of the night I have said before that the resources of Gilroyd were nothing very remarkable; still there was the Saxton Cricket Club, who practised zealously, and always welcomed William, whose hit to leg was famous, and even recorded as commendable in the annual volume of the great Mr. Lillywhite; where he was noted, in terms that perplexed Aunt Dinah, as a promising young bat, with a good defence. He fished a little; and he played at fives with young Trevor of Revington, whom nobody very much liked — the squire of Saxton, who assumed territorial and other airs that were oppressive, although Revington was only two thousand five hundred pounds a year; but in that modest neighbourhood, he was a very important person, and knew that fact very well.

  He had of late distinguished Violet with a slight admiration, that ought to have been gratifying. Once or twice he paid old Miss Perfect a little neighbourly, condescending visit, and loitered a good deal about the garden, and that acre and a half of shrubbery, which she called “the grounds.” He sometimes joined in the walk home from church, and sometimes in other walks; and Aunt Perfect was pleased and favourable, and many of the Saxton mothers and daughters were moved to envy and malice.

  “I played to-day,” said William, giving an account of his hours at tea to the ladies, “two rubbers of fives; with whom do you think?”

  He stopped, smiling slily on Violet, who was steadfastly looking down on Miss Perfect’s crest on her tea-spoon.

  “Well, I’m sure you know by that unerring instinct which poets speak of,” said William, “but it is hardly fair to ask you to name him.”

  Violet looked up, having blushed very prettily, but not very well pleased.

  “Of course I mean Trevor — Vane Trevor — of Revington. It sounds very well. Trevor was two years my senior at school; he left at the end of the third half after I came; that makes him nearly twenty-five now. How old are you, Vi? — you’d make a very pretty mistress of Revington; yes, indeed, Vi, or anywhere else. Don’t be vexed, but tell me exactly how old you are.”

  He tapped with his pencil on the table to hasten her answer, as he looked at her, smiling a little sadly.

  “How old?” she repeated.

  “Well?”

  “Past seventeen. Why do you want to know?” she added laughing.

  “Well, he’s not quite five-and-twenty yet; only twenty-four to your seventeen. Seven years is a very pretty difference.”

  “What are you talking about, William? This kind of thing is thought very funny: it is very disagreeable. If people will talk nonsense, do let it be amusing. You used to be sometimes amusing.”

  “That was long ago, when I told you ‘Sinbad the Sailor,’ and ‘The Romance of the Forest;’ before the romance of the shrubbery commenced.”

  “Folly!” exclaimed Violet.

  CHAPTER IX.

  IN WHICH MISS VIOLET SAYS WHAT SHE THINKS OF MR. VANE TREVOR, AND IS VIOLET NO LONGER.

  “NOW, I tell you,” continued William Maubray, and he glanced at Aunt Dinah; but she was reading, with her gold spectacles on, the second of a series of old letters, which she had in an old stamped leather box beside her, and had forgotten all else. “You really must tell me what you think of Vane Trevor?”

  Miss Vi fixed her glowing eyes full upon his for a moment, and then dropped them suddenly. His were full of their old, gentle, goodnatured mirth.

  There was a little pause, and, suddenly looking up, she said rather petulantly:

  “Think of him? Why, I suppose I think what everyone else does. I think him handsome; I think him agreeable; I think he has an estate; I think he looks like a gentleman; and I think he is the only man who appears in this neighbourhood that is not in one way or other a bore. Shall I sing you a song?.”

  And with heightened colour and bright eyes, this handsome girl sat down to the piano, which had a cracked and ancient voice, like the reedy thrum of a hurdy-gurdy, contrasting quaintly with her own mellow tones, and she sang — nothing to the purpose, nothing with a sly, allegoric satire in it, but the first thing that came into her head — sweet and sad as a song of old times; and ancient Miss Perfect, for a verse or so, lowered her letter, and listened, smiling, with a little sigh; and William, listening also, fell into a brown study, as he looked on the pretty songstress, and her warblings mingled with his dreams.

  “Thank you, little Vi,” said he, rising with a sudden smile, and standing beside her as the music ceased. “Very pretty — very sweet.”

  “I am glad you like it, William,” she said, kindly.

  “William, again!” he repeated.

  “Well — yes.”

  “And why not Willie, as it used to be?” he persisted. “Because it sounds foolish, somehow. I’m sure you think so. I do.”

  It seemed to him as, with a sad smile, he looked at her, thinking over the words that sounded so like a farewell, so light and cruel, too, that there yet was wisdom — that precocious wisdom with which nature accomplishes the weaker sex — in her decision; and something of approval lighted up his sad smile, and he said, with a little nod:

  “I believe the young lady says wisely; yes, you are a wise little woman, and I submit.”

  Perhaps she was a little disappointed at his ready acquiescence; at all events she wound up with a loud chord on the piano, and, standing up, said:

  “Yes, it sounds foolish, and so, indeed, I think does William; and people can’t go on being children always, and talking nonsense; and you know we are no relations — at least that I know of — and I’ll call you — yes I will — Mr. Maubray. People may be just as friendly, and yet — and yet call one another by their right names. And now, Mr. Maubray, will you have some tea?”

  “No, thanks; no more tea tonight I’m sure it has lost its flavour. It would not taste like tea.”

  “What’s the matter with the tea?” asked Miss Perfect, over the edge of her letter. “You don’t like your tea, William? Is not it strong enough?”

  “Quite; too much; almost bitter, and a little cold.”

  “Fancy, child,” said Aunt Dinah, who apprehended a new attack on her tea-chest, and hated waste. “I think it particularly good this evening,” and she sipped a little in evidence of her liking, and once more relapsed into reading.

  “I can add water,” said Violet, touching the little ivory handle of the tea-urn with the tip of her finger, and not choosing to apprehend William’s allegory.

  “No, thank you, Vi — Violet, I mean — Miss Darkwell; indeed, I forgot. What shall I read tonight?” and he strode listlessly to the little bookcase, whose polished surface flashed pleasantly to the flicker of the wood fire. “‘Boswell’s Johnson,’

  ‘Sir Charles Grandison,’

  ‘Bishop Horsley’s Sermons,’

  ‘Trimmer’s Work
s,’

  ‘A Simple Story,’

  ‘Watts’ Sacred Songs,” Rasselas,’

  ‘Poems, by Alfred Tennyson.’”

  His quiet voice as he read the names on the backs of Aunt Dinah’s miscellaneous collection, sounded changed and older, ever so much, in Violet’s ear. All on a sudden for both, a part of their lives had been cut off, and a very pleasant time changed irrevocably to a retrospect “I think ‘ Tennyson.’ What do you?” he asked, turning a smile that seemed faded now, but kindly as ever, upon her.

  As the old name was gone, and the new intolerable, he compounded by calling her by none; and she, likewise, in her answer.

  “Oh! yes, Tennyson, Tennyson, by all means; that is, if Miss Perfect wishes.”

  “Yes — oh! to be sure; but haven’t you read it before?” acquiesced Miss Perfect.

  William smiled at Violet, and said to Miss Dinah, “I think — and don’t you?” — this was to Vi, parenthetically, “that poetry is never heard fairly on a first reading. It resembles music — you must know it a little to enjoy it.”

  “That’s just what I think,” said Violet, eagerly.

  “Very good, young people,” said my aunt, with a little toss of her head. “For my part, I think there’s but one Book will bear repeated reading, and that is the Bible.”

  “Not even ‘Elihu Bung?’” suggested William.

  “There — read your poetry,” said Miss Perfect. “I shan’t interrupt; I’m reading these, looking back for the date of a family event.”

  This was an exercise not unfrequently imposed on her by Henbane, who now and then made a slip in such matters, and thus perplexed and troubled Aunt Dinah, who had sometimes her secret misgivings about his accuracy and morality.

  “What shall I read?” asked William in a lower tone. “Anything, ‘Mariana,’” she answered.

  “The ‘Moated Grange,’” repeated William, and smiled. “‘The poetry of monotony.’ I could fancy, if a few pleasant faces were gone, this Gilroyd Hall, much as I like it, very like the Moated Grange.”

  And without more preface he read that exquisite little poem through, and then leaned back in his chair, the book open upon the table; pretty Violet sat opposite, working at her crochet, in a reverie, as was he as he gazed on her.

  “Where did she learn all that? How much wiser they are than we What a jolly ass I was at seventeen, and ail the fellows. What fools — weren’t they? — in things like that; and by Jove! she’s quite right, I could not go on Vi-ing her all my days, just because when she was a child she used to be here. They are certainly awfully wise in that sort of thing. Pretty head she has — busy, busy — quite a little world within it now, I dare say. What a wonder of wonders, that little casket! Pretty hair, awfully pretty; and the shape of her head, so pretty; yet the oval reminds me, right or wrong, of a serpent’s head; but she has nothing of that in her, only the wisdom; yes, the wisdom, and, perhaps, the fascination. She’ll make some fellow’s heart sore yet; she’ll make some great match, I dare say; but that’s a long way off, eight years; yes, she’ll be twenty-four then; time enough before her.”

  “Is there any cricket for tomorrow?” asked Vi on a sudden.

  “No match. I’m going up to look at Revington. Trevor said he’d call for me early — eleven o’clock — for me, mind; and you know I begin to feel an interest in Revington.”

  “Oh! it’s very pretty, great old timber,” she said, “and a handsome place, and a good estate — three thousand a year, only it owes some money. What an ambitious, audacious person I must be. I’m certain you think so, because it is quite plain I covet my neighbour’s house, and his ox, and his ass, and everything that is his; and coveting, Dr. Mainwaring tells us, is the fountain-head of all iniquity, for how could a person so poor as I ever obtain all these fine things without fraud and chicanery?”

  Miss Violet was talking a little recklessly and angrily, but she looked unusually handsome, her colour was so beautiful, and there was so strange a fire in her vexed eyes. What was the meaning of this half-suppressed scorn, and who its real object? How enigmatical they grow so soon as the summer hours of fascination, and of passion with its disguises and sorrows, in all their transient glow and beauty, approach — the season of hope, of triumph, and of aching hearts.

  CHAPTER X.

  VANE TREVOR IS DISCUSSED AND APPEARS.

  It was in this mysterious turbulent frame of mind that old Winnie Dobbs, bearing the Bible and book of family prayers, surprised Miss Violet Darkwell, and recalled Aunt Dinah from the sound and fury of forty years ago, now signifying no more than the discoloured paper on which they were recorded.

  “Dear me! can it be a quarter to ten already?” exclaimed Miss Perfect, plucking her watch from her side and inspecting it. “So it is; come in.”

  And fat Mrs. Podgers, the cook, and Tom, with his grimmest countenance, and the little girl with a cap on, looking mild and frightened.

  So, according to the ancient usage of Gilroyd Hall, to William’s lot fell the reading of the Bible, and to Aunt Dinah’s that of the prayers, and then the little congregation broke up, and away went Vi to her bedroom, with old Winnie.

  William was not worse, nor, I dare say, much better than other young Cambridge men of his day and college; but he liked these little “services” in which he officiated, and they entered into his serene and pleasant recollections of that sequestered habitation.

  “Well, William dear, I thank God I am spared to be with you a little longer.”

  “Amen,” he said, “you dear aunt, dear, dear old Aunt Dinah.”

  And they kissed very lovingly, and there war a silence, which Aunt Dinah in a few minutes broke by mentioning the very subject at that moment in his mind.

  “You saw Violet a good deal grown — very pretty figure — in fact, I think her lovely; but we must not tell her so, you know. She has been very much admired, and a good, affectionate, amiable little soul she is. There’s young Mr. Trevor. I can tell you people are beginning to talk about it. What do you think?” William set down his bedroom candle on the tea table, rubbed the apex of its extinguisher with the tip of his finger, and returned an answer answerless.

  “He’s very good-looking; isn’t he? But he thinks a lot of himself; and don’t you think it would be an awful pity little Vi should be married so soon?”

  “Then you think he means to ask her?” said Miss Perfect, her silver pencil-case to her chin, her head a little aside, and looking very curiously into her nephew’s eyes.

  “I don’t know; I haven’t a notion. He said yesterday he thought her very pretty; but Trevor always talks like no end of a swell, and I really think he fancies a princess, or something of the sort, would hardly be good enough for him.”

  “It would, of course, be a very good match for Vi,” said Miss Perfect, dropping her eyes, perhaps a little disappointed, and running her pencil-case back and forward slowly on the edge of William’s plated candlestick, from which they both seemed to look for inspiration; “but a girl so pretty as she may look higher than Mr. Trevor without presumption.”

  “Yes, indeed, and there’s no hurry, Heaven knows.

  I don’t think Trevor half good enough for her,” said William “Oh, I don’t say that, but — but more unlikely things have happened.”

  “Does he — does he make love to her?” said William, who drew altogether upon the circulating library for his wisdom in those matters.

  “He certainly admires her very much; he has been very attentive. I’m sure he likes her, and I can’t hear that he is anything but a straightforward, honourable young man.”

  “I suppose he is,” said William; “I’m sure he’s that. And what does Violet — Miss Darkwell — say?”

  “Say! Why, of course I can’t ask her to say anything till he speaks. I dare say she likes him, as why should she not? But that’s only conjecture, you know; and you are not to hint it to him, mind, if he should question or poke you on the subject.”

  “Oh, no, certainly
,” answered William, and there came a long pause. “But indeed, aunt, I don’t think Vane Trevor half good enough for her.”

  “Oh! that’s for them, my dear, to settle. There’s nothing, in point of prudence, against it.”

  “No — oh, no. Everything very well. Lucky fellow to be able to marry when he likes.”

  “And — but I forgot you don’t mind. You think there’s nothing in it. Still I ma> tell you I have had — old Winnie and I — some answers.”

  “Table-rapping?” said William.

  “A little séance. We sit down together, Winnie and I; and some responses, in my mind, can hardly refer to anything else, and most sweet and comforting they have been.”

  Once on this subject, my aunt was soon deep in it, and told her story of the toad which turned into a hand; whereupon William related his dream, and the evidences afforded by his waking senses of the reality of the visitation. My aunt was at once awestruck and delighted.

  “Now, William, you’ll read, I’ve no doubt, the wonderful experiences of others, having had such remarkable ones of your own. Since my hand was held in that spirit-hand — no doubt the same which seized yours — I have become accessible to impressions from the invisible world, such as I had no idea of before. You need not be uncomfortable or nervous. It is all benevolent — or, at worst, just. I’ve never seen or felt that hand but once; the relation is established for ever by a single pressure. I have satisfied Dr. Drake — a very intelligent man, and reasonable — convinced him, he admits. And now, dear William, there is another link between us; and if in the mysterious ways of Providence, you should after all be taken first, I shall have the happiness of communion with you. Goodnight, dear, and God bless you, and be careful to put out your candle.”

  So William departed, and notwithstanding Miss Perfect’s grisly conversation, he slept soundly, and did not dream of the shadowy giant, nor even of Trevor and Violet.