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Works of Ellen Wood

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by Ellen Wood


  “But what does my mother want with your tickets?” reiterated Travice, unable to understand that point in the matter. “Why can’t she buy tickets for herself?”

  “Mr. Arkell has scruples, I believe. But, Travice, I am happy to — —”

  “Well, I shall just tell my mother what I think of this!” was the indignant interruption.

  “Don’t, Travice,” said Mrs. Arkell. “If you only knew how glad I am to have the opportunity of rendering any little service to your home!” she whispered, drawing him to her with her gentle hand; “if you knew but half the kindness my husband and I receive from your father! I am only sorry I did not think to offer the tickets at first; I ought to have done so. It is all right; let us say no more about it.”

  Travice bent his lips to the flushed cheek: he loved her quite as much as he did his own mother.

  “Take care, or you will get feverish; and that would never do, you know.”

  “My dear boy, I am feverish already; I have been a little so all day; and I am sure there could be no concert for me to-morrow, had I a roomful of tickets. It has all happened for the best, I say. I should only have been at the trouble of finding somebody to take Lucy.”

  As he was leaving the room he came upon Lucy in the passage, who was returning to it — the tears dried, or partially so; and if the long dark eye-lashes glistened yet, there was a happy smile upon the sweet red lips. Few could school themselves as did that thoughtful girl of fifteen, Lucy Arkell.

  Travice stopped her as he closed the door.

  “You’ll trust me, will you not, Lucy?”

  “For what?” she asked.

  “To put this to rights. It — —”

  “Oh pray, pray don’t!” she cried, fearing she hardly knew what. “Surely you are not thinking of asking for the tickets back again! I would not use them for the world. And they would be of no use to us now, for mamma says she shall not be well enough to go, and I don’t think she will. I shall not mind staying at home.”

  Travice placed his two hands on her shoulders, and looked into her face with his sweet smile and his speaking eyes; she coloured strangely beneath the gaze.

  “I’ll tell you what it is, Lucy: you are just one of those to get put upon through life and never stand up for yourself. It’s a good thing you have me at your side.”

  “You can’t be at my side all through life,” said Lucy, laughing.

  “Don’t make too sure of that, Mademoiselle.” And the colour in her face deepened to a glowing crimson, and her heart beat wildly, as the significance of the tone made itself heard, in conjunction with his retreating footsteps.

  He dashed home, spending about two minutes in the process, and dashed into the room where his mother was, her bonnet on yet, talking to Charlotte, and impressing upon her the fact that their going to the concert must be kept an entire secret from all, until the moment of starting arrived, but especially from papa and Sophy. Charlotte, in a glow of delight, acquiesced in everything.

  “I say, mamma, what’s this about your taking Mrs. Peter’s tickets?”

  He threw his trencher on the table, as he burst in upon them with the question, and his usually refined face was in a very unrefined glow of heat. The interruption was most unwelcome. Mrs. Arkell would have put him down at once, but that she knew, from past experience, Travice had an inconvenient knack of not allowing himself to be put down. So she made a merit of necessity, and told how Mr. Arkell had interdicted their buying tickets.

  “Well, of all the cool things ever done, that was about the coolest — for you to go and get those tickets from Mrs. Peter!” he said, when he had heard her to an end. “They don’t have so many opportunities of going out, that you should deprive them of this one. I’d have stopped away from concerts for ever before I had done it.”

  “You be quiet, Travice,” struck in Charlotte; “it is no business of yours.”

  “You be quiet,” retorted Travice. “And it is my business, because I choose to make it mine. Mother, just one question: Will you let Lucy go with you to the concert? Mrs. Peter fears she shall be too ill to go. I’m sure I don’t wonder if she is,” he continued, with a spice of impertinence; “I should be, if I had had such a shabby trick played upon me.”

  “It is like your impudence to ask it, Travice. When do I take out Lucy Arkell? She is not going to the concert.”

  “She is going to the concert,” returned Travice, that decision in his tone, that incipient rebellion, that his mother so much disliked. “You have deprived them of their tickets, and I shall, therefore, buy them two in place of them. And when my father asks me why I spent money on the concert against his wish, I shall just lay the whole case before him, and he will see that there was no help for it. I shall go and tell him now, before I — —”

  “You will do no such thing, Travice,” interrupted Mrs. Arkell, her face in a flame. “I forbid you to carry the tale to your father. Do you hear me? I forbid you; — and I am your mother. How dare you talk of spending your money on this concert? Buy two tickets, indeed!”

  The first was a mandate that Travice would not break; the latter he conveniently ignored. Flinging his trencher on his head, he went straight off to buy the tickets, and carried them to Mrs. Peter Arkell’s. There was not much questioning as to how he obtained them, for Mrs. St. John was sitting there. That they were fresh tickets might be seen by the numbers.

  “My dear Travice,” cried Mrs. Peter, “it is kind of you to bring these tickets; but we cannot use them. I shall be unable to go; and there is no one to take Lucy.”

  “Nonsense, there are plenty to take her,” returned Travice. “Mrs. Prattleton would be delighted to take her; and I dare say,” he added, in his rather free manner, as he threw his beaming glance into the visitor’s face, “that Mrs. St. John would not mind taking charge of her.”

  “I will take charge of her,” said Mrs. St. John — and the tone of the voice showed how genuinely ready was the acquiescence— “that is, if I go myself. But Frederick is ill to-day, and I am not sure that I can leave him to-morrow. But Lucy shall go with some of us. My niece, Anne, will be here, I expect, to-night. She is coming to pay a long visit.”

  “What is the matter with Frederick?” asked Travice, quickly.

  “It appears like incipient fever. I suppose he has caught a violent cold.”

  “I’ll go and see him,” said Travice, catching up his trencher, and vaulting off before anyone could stop him.

  Mrs. St. John rose, saying something final about the taking Lucy, and the arrangements for the morrow. She was the only one of the acquaintances of Miss Lucy Cheveley who had not abandoned Mrs. Peter Arkell. It is true the St. Johns were not very often at the Palmery, but when they were there, Mrs. St. John never failed to be found once a week sitting with the wife of the poor tutor, so neglected by the world.

  And, after all, when the morrow came, Mrs. Peter Arkell was too ill to go. So she folded the spare ticket in paper, and sent it, with her love, to Miss Sophia Arkell.

  CHAPTER XVIII.

  THE CONCERT.

  Never did there rise a brighter morning than the one on which the amateur concert was to take place. And Westerbury was in a ferment of excitement; carriages were rolling about, bringing the county people into the town; and fine dresses, every colour of the rainbow, crowded the streets.

  Three parts of the audience walked to the concert, nothing loth, gentle and simple, to exhibit their attire in the blazing sunlight. It was certainly suspiciously bright that morning, had people been at leisure to notice it.

  The Guildhall was filled to overflowing, when three ladies came in, struggling for a place. One was a middle-aged lady, quiet looking, and rather dowdy; the other was an elegant girl of seventeen, with clear brown eyes and a pointed chin; the third was Lucy Arkell.

  There was not a seat to be found. The elder lady looked annoyed; but there was nothing for it but to stand with the mass. And they were standing when they caught — at least Lucy did — the rovi
ng eye of Travice Arkell.

  Now, it happened that the four senior pupils of the college school — not the private pupils of Mr. Wilberforce, but the king’s scholars — were being made of much account at this concert; and, by accident, or design, a side sofa, near to the orchestra — one of the best places — was assigned to them. Travice Arkell suddenly darted from his seat on it, and began to elbow his way down the room, for every avenue was choked. He reached Lucy at last.

  “How late you are, Lucy! But I can get you a seat — a capital one, too. Will you allow me to pilot you to a sofa?” he courteously added to had the two ladies with her.

  The elder lady turned at the address, and saw a tall, slender young man, with a pale, refined face. The college cap under his arm betrayed that he belonged to the collegiate school; otherwise, she had thought him too old for a king’s scholar.

  “You are very kind. In a few moments. But we ought to wait until this song that they are beginning is over.”

  It was not a song, but a duet — and a duet that had given no end of trouble to the executive management — for none of the ladies had been found suitable to undertake the first part in it. It required a remarkably clear, high, bell-like voice, to do it justice; and the cathedral organist, privately wishing the concert far enough — for he had never been so much pestered in all his life as since he undertook the arrangements — proposed Henry Arkell. And Mrs. Lewis, who took the second part, was fain to accept him: albeit, the boy was no favourite of hers.

  “How singularly beautiful!” murmured the elder lady to Travice Arkell, as the clear voice burst forth.

  “Yes, he has an excellent voice. The worst of him is, he is timid. He will out-grow that.”

  “I did not allude to the voice; I spoke of the boy himself. I never saw a more beautiful face. Who is he?”

  Travice smiled. “It is Henry Arkell, Lucy’s brother, and my cousin.”

  “Ah! I knew his mother once. Mrs. St. John was telling me her history last night. Anne, my dear, you have heard me speak of Lucy Cheveley: that is her son, and it is the same face. Then you,” she continued, “must be Mr. Travice Arkell? Hush!”

  For the duet was in full force just then, and Mrs. Lewis’s rich contralto voice was telling well.

  “Who is she?” asked Travice of Lucy in a whisper.

  “Mrs. James. She’s the governess,” came the answer.

  When the duet was over, Travice Arkell held out his arm to Mrs. James. “If you will do me the honour of taking it, the getting through the crowd may be easier for you,” he said. But Mrs. James drew back, as she thanked him, and motioned him towards the younger lady with her. So Travice took the younger lady; not being quite certain, but suspecting who she was; and Mrs. James and Lucy followed as they best could.

  And his reward was a whole host of daggers darted at him — if looks can dart them. The two ladies were complete strangers to the aristocracy of the grounds; and seeing Peter Arkell’s daughter in their wake, the supposition that they belonged in some way to that renowned tutor, but obscure man, was not unnatural. Mrs. Lewis, who had come down to her sofa then, and Mrs. Aultane, who sat with her, were especially indignant. How dared that class of people thrust themselves at the top of the room amidst them?

  “Travice,” said Mrs. Arkell, bending forward from one of the cross benches, and pulling his sleeve as he passed on, “you are making yourself too absurd!”

  “Am I! I am very sorry.”

  But he did not look sorry; on the contrary, he looked highly amused; and he bent his head now and again to say a word of encouragement to the fair girl on his arm, touching the difficulties of their progress. On, he bore, to the sofa he had quitted, and ordered the three seniors he had left on it to move off. In school or out, they did not disobey him; and they moved off accordingly. He seated the two ladies and Lucy on it, and stood near the arm himself; never once more sitting down throughout the concert. But he stayed with them the whole of the time, talking as occasion offered.

  But, oh! that false morning brightness! Before the concert was over, the rain was coming down with fury, pelting, as the college boys chose to phrase it, cats and dogs. Very few had given orders for their carriages to be there; and they could only wait in hopes they would come, or send messengers after them. What, perhaps, rendered it more inconvenient was, that the concert was over a full half-hour earlier than had been expected.

  The impatient company began to congregate in the lower hall; its folding doors of egress and its large windows looking to the street. Some one had been considerate enough to have a fire lighted at the upper end; and most inviting it was, now the day had turned to damp. The head master, who had despatched one of the boys to order his close carriage to be brought immediately, gave the fire a vigorous poke, and turned round to look about him. He was a little man, with silver-rimmed spectacles.

  Two causes were exciting some commotion in the minds of the lesser satellites of the grounds. The one was the presuming behaviour of those people with Lucy Arkell, and the unjustifiable folly of Travice; the other was the remarkable absence of the Dean of Westerbury and his family from the concert. It, the absence, was put down to the dean’s having at the last moment refused to patronize it, in consequence of its growing unpopularity; and Mrs. St. John’s absence was attributed to the same cause. People knew later that the dean and Mrs. Beauclerc had remained at home in consequence of the death of a relative; but that is of no consequence to us.

  “The dean is given to veering round,” remarked Mrs. Aultane in an under tone to the head master. “Those good-natured men generally are.”

  The master cleared his throat, as a substitute for a reply. It was not his place to speak against the dean. And, indeed, he had no cause. He walked to the window nearest him, and looked out at the carriages and flies as they came tardily up.

  Travice Arkell seemed determined to offend. He was securing chairs for those ladies now near the fire; and Mrs. Lewis put her glass to her eye, and surveyed them from head to foot. Her wild brother, Benjamin Carr, could not have done it more insolently.

  “Who is that lady, Arkell?” demanded the master, of Travice, when he got the opportunity.

  “It is a Mrs. James, sir.”

  “Oh. A friend of yours?”

  “No, sir. I never saw her until to-day.”

  Mrs. Aultane bent her head. “Mrs. James? Who is Mrs. James? And the other one, too? I should be glad to know, Mr. Travice Arkell.”

  “I can’t tell you much about them, Mrs. Aultane,” returned Travice, suppressing the laugh of mischief in his eye. “I saw them for the first time in the concert-room.”

  “They came with your relative, Peter Arkell’s daughter.”

  “Exactly so. That is, she came with them.”

  “Some people from the country, I suppose,” concluded Mrs. Aultane, with as much hauteur as she thought it safe to put into her tone. “It is easy to be seen they have no style about them.”

  Travice laughed and went across the room. He was speaking to the ladies in question, when a gentleman of three or four-and-twenty came up and tapped him on the back.

  “Won’t you speak to me? It is Travice Arkell, I see, though he has shot up into a man.”

  One moment’s indecision, and Travice took the hand in his. “Anderson! Can it be?”

  “It can, and is. Captain Anderson, if you please, sir, now.”

  “No!”

  “It’s true. I have been lucky, and have got my company early.”

  “But what brings you here? I did not know you were in Westerbury.”

  “I arrived only this morning. Hearing of your concert when I got here, I thought I’d look in; but it was half over then, and I barely got inside the room. You don’t mean to say that you are in the school still?”

  Travice laughed, and held out the betraying cap. “It is a shame. I am too big for it. I have only a month or two longer to stay.”

  “But you must have been in beyond your time.”

  “
I know I have.”

  “And who is senior?”

  “Need you ask, looking at my size. This is Lucy; have you forgotten her?”

  Captain Anderson turned. He had been educated in the college school, a private pupil of the head master’s. Travice Arkell was only a junior in it when Anderson left; but Anderson had been intimate at the houses of both the Arkells.

  “Miss Lucy sprung up to this! You were the prettiest little child when I left. And your sisters, Travice? I should like to see them.”

  Lucy laughed and blushed. Captain Anderson began talking to Mrs. James, and to the young lady who sat between her and Lucy.

  “I can’t stop,” he presently said. “I see the master there. And that — yes, that must be Mr. and Mrs. Prattleton. There! the master is scanning me through his spectacles, wondering whether it’s me or somebody else. I’ll come back to you, Arkell.”

  He went forward, and was beset at once. People were beginning to recognise him. Anderson, the private pupil, had been popular in the grounds. Mrs. Aultane on one side, Mrs. Lewis on the other, took forcible possession of him, ere he had been a minute with the head master and his wife. It was hard to believe that the former somewhat sickly, fair-haired private pupil, who had been coddled by Mrs. Wilberforce with bark and flannel and beaten-up eggs, could be this fine soldierly man.

  “Those ladies don’t belong to you, do they?” cried Mrs. Aultane, beginning to fear she had made some mistake in her treatment of the ladies in question, if they did belong to Anderson.

  “Ladies! what ladies?”

  “Those to whom Travice Arkell is talking. He has been with them all day.”

  “They don’t belong to me. What of them?”

  “Nothing. Only these inferior people, strangers, have no right to push themselves amidst us, taking up the best places. We are obliged to draw a line, you know, in this manufacturing town; and none but strangers, ignorant of our distinctions, would dare to break it.”

  Captain Anderson laughed; he could not quite understand. “I don’t think they are inferior,” he said, indicating the two ladies. “Anything but that, although they may belong to manufacturers, and not be in your set. The younger one is charming; so is Lucy Arkell.”

 

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