by Ellen Wood
Mrs. Beauclerc, thin and discontented-looking as of yore, the red tip of her nose growing redder year by year, sat at the French window of the room, talking to Georgina. Georgina, in a clear pink muslin dress, with open lace sleeves on her pretty wrists, stood just outside the window. She was partly listening to her mother, — as much as she ever did listen to Mrs. Beauclerc’s grumblings, — partly humming to herself the piece that Sarah was playing, as her eyes wandered wistfully, far far out in the distance, seeking one who did not come.
“What are you looking at?” Mrs. Beauclerc suddenly asked in sharp tones. “You never pay attention to me, Georgina.”
“I thought — I thought—” and though the answer was given with hesitation, she spoke the straightforward truth—” I thought I saw Frederick St. John. Some one was there, but he has turned away again, whoever it was. What do you want to say, mamma?” — .
“Mrs. St. John and Anne partly promised to come in and dine with us, sans ceremonie, this evening. I want you to go and ask them whether they are really coming.”
She stepped gaily over the threshold into the room, all her inertness gone. The short secluded walk through the private grounds would be charming enough on that warm autumn day; but had it been one of stones and brambles, Georgina had deemed it Eden, with the prospect of his presence at the end of it. She halted for a moment to ask a question; to ask it indifferently, as if it were of no moment to her, and she tossed her handkerchief carelessly about as she spoke it.”
“Is Frederick to come with them?”
“Dear me, Georgina! Is he to come! He can come if he likes.”
Absorbed in her music, Sarah Beauclerc had heard nothing of this. Georgina came in again with her bonnet on. “Sarah, I am going up to Castle Wafer. Will you come?”
The light of assent shone all too eagerly for a moment in Sarah’s eyes; but she recollected her resolution — to forget — and declined.
“Not this morning.”
“Very well,” said Georgina. “Don’t say I didn’t ask you. You said so once before, if you remember, Sarah, and a great passion you were in.”
Sarah Beauclerc’s lip curled. “I don’t think I was ever in a passion in my life. It is only the uncontrolled, the ill-regulated, who so forget themselves.”
“I would rather go into a good hearty passion and get it over, than be cold as an icicle. What a passion I once put Fred St. John into!” added Georgina, half losing herself in the remembrance. “He can be passionate, if you like!”
“I don’t believe it.”
“Disbelieve it, then,” equably returned Georgina. “I have seen him in more rages than one. It’s not a thing to forget, I can tell you. He is sweet-tempered in ordinary life; ay, very; but on rare occasions he can be roused. Ask Mrs. St. John; ask Anne.”
She stepped out from the window, nodding to Mrs. Beauclerc, who was now at a distance bending over her favourite flowerbed, and pursued her walk.
Suddenly a butterfly crossed her path; she was then getting near to Castle Wafer. It was one of those beautiful insects, its wings purple and gold; and Georgina, no better than a butterfly herself and variable as one, began to give chase to it. In turning suddenly the corner of a hedge of variegated evergreens, she came upon a stranger.
Springing back as one startled, her heart beat a shade quicker.
Not that there was anything particularly to startle her, except that he was unknown, and that he stood in a stealthy attitude. He wore a rather remarkable hat, inasmuch as its crown was higher than those of ordinary hats and went tapering off in sugar-loaf fashion; his clothes were shabby-genteel. Altogether he put Georgina in mind of the portrait of Mephistopheles, as represented on the cover of one of her pieces of music.
He had been bending forward, peering through the trees at Castle Wafer; the position he held commanded full view of the front of the house. But he appeared equally startled with Miss Beauclerc, at being interrupted, glided away, and was lost to view.
“What a strange-looking man!” exclaimed Georgina. “And what was he doing there? Perhaps wanting to take a photograph of Castle Wafer! That tall hat must have been the one I saw from our house.”
She emerged from the sheltered path, crossed the lawn, stepped over the terrace, and into the drawing-room. The families were too intimate to stand on any sort of ceremony with each other, and as frequently entered each other’s houses in this manner as by the more formal doorway. The room was empty, but almost immediately Frederick St. John came into it.
His eye fell upon her for a moment only, and she caught the half-wistful, half-eager glance that went roaming round in search of another.
“Are you alone?” he asked, as he shook hands with her.
“Sarah is not with me,” was the petulant answer. It was utterly impossible to Georgina Beauclerc not to betray her moods: and none but herself knew how cruel was the pain ever rankling in her heart. “But I did not come to pay a visit to you,” she went on pointedly. “Where’s Mr. St. John?”
“He has gone out, and will not be back until to-morrow.”
She had only asked the question in that listless fashion that requires no answer. The answer, however, aroused her surprise. Isaac St. John gone out until to-morrow!
“He left this morning for Alnwick,” said Frederick. “He has gone to see his little ward, Benja St. John. A long journey, for he is posting. Did you want him, Georgina?”
“No; I came to see Mrs. St. John. Mamma supposes she and Anne remember their engagement to come in this afternoon and remain to dinner. Will you come also?”
“Is it a dinner-party?
“A dinner-party here! Don’t expect that. You may find nothing but mutton,” she added, with a laugh. “It’s ourselves only. Will you come?”
“I think not, Georgie. Perhaps, though: I’ll see between now and dinner-time.”
He stepped out without further word or look. Ah, it needed not his coldness of manner to convince Georgina Beauclerc how utterly indifferent she was to him! Lady Anne came in, and she began laughing and talking as though there were not such a thing as misplaced love in the world. In a few minutes Georgina left again, bearing Mrs. St. John’s message of acceptance of the invitation. As she was walking leisurely along she caught sight of Frederick in the distance. He was standing still, apparently examining something in his hand. Georgina’s quick thought wondered whether it was the beautiful butterfly of purple and gold. Suddenly, in this same moment, as she looked, she saw the strange man go rather swiftly up to him and touch him on the shoulder.
She saw Frederick St. John wheel round; she saw him fling the man’s arm off with a haughty gesture. And after a few minutes’ parleying, during which the man showed him a paper — minutes of hesitation as it seemed, for Mr. St. John looked about him as a man uncertain of his course — they finally walked away together. Georgina went home wondering.
Mrs. St. John and Lady Anne came in about four o’clock, bringing their work with them. Lady Anne was making a collection of ferns, and she began doing something to a dried leaf with water and a sponge. Mrs. St. John and Mrs. Beauclerc were each knitting a soft woollen counterpane of divers colours, and began comparing progress.
“Where’s Frederick?” asked Mrs. Beauclerc. “Is he not coming?”
“I don’t know where he is,” cried Mrs. St. John, in quick tones and looking up, as though the question recalled something to her recollection. “We have seen nothing of him since the morning, and just now I received a pencilled note from him, saying he might not be in until to-night, or perhaps not at all, if he found his business detained him very late.”
“Has he gone to Lexington?”
“We don’t know where he has gone. But it is very strange he should go out for any length of time, without mentioning it to me. The note was not dated, and the servants said a strange boy brought it. So very thoughtless of Frederick, to go out in this flighty manner! Anne was dreaming of him this afternoon.”
“Dreaming of him!” rep
eated Mrs. Beauclerc.
Lady Anne laughed. “Mrs. St. John insisted at the time that I was dreaming,” she said. “We drove out in the pony-carriage after luncheon, and on passing the Barley Mow, I could have declared that I saw Frederick at one of the upper windows. But when we drew closer he had turned into a strange man in a tall hat. I suppose I must have been thinking of him, and so fancied it: or else the sun, which was full in my face, caused the mistake. Georgina, what is the matter?”
It was time to ask. Georgina Beauclerc was standing as one transfixed. She was as clever a girl at putting two and two together as could well be found; and the whole mystery seemed to suddenly clear itself. Very rapidly she drew her conclusions: Frederick St. John had been arrested for debt, and the man was keeping him prisoner at the Barley Mow!
A mist gathered before her sight: her heart sank within her. Georgina had long known that he was in some temporary embarrassment; it came to her knowledge through an incautious word of his own; and she had cherished the knowledge as a secret link between them. But she had not suspected this, and it came upon her with a crushing fear.
She burst into laughter, for the question of Lady Anne recalled her to herself, making some evasive excuse. She would have died rather than betray him.
“I know,” she said. “He has gone over to Lexington to avoid dining with so many women. You could not expect him to stay for us, Mrs. St. John.”
“Very true, my dear; the same thought had occurred to me,” was the satisfied answer. “But I don’t see why he should hint at not coming home to sleep.”
“There may be a thousand things to detain him,” said Georgina, throwing back her pretty head, as if to cool the fever crimsoning her cheeks. “And who knows but he may have gone on to Sir John Ingram’s? I made him so mad one day last year, teasing him about that gawky Jane Ingram! Mamma nearly boxed my ears for it.”
Watching her opportunity, Georgina stole away, snatched her hat and a garden mantle from the peg in the hall, and went out. Where was she going, this wild girl? Need you ask? In her impulsive, free, careless fashion, she was hastening to the Barley Mow, to see Frederick St. John.
It sounds very bad, no doubt to the reader’s ears. The name of the “Barley Mow” itself would be enough to alarm modest people, without the gentleman. But in this quiet little spot, the Barley Mow was as sedate and respectable a house to enter as any private one; and Georgina had many a time gone into it with Dr. Beauclerc to sit ten minutes with one of its daughters, who had been an invalid for years.
She went flying onwards, and gained the door in a few minutes. The landlord, a respectable, simple old yeoman, in a yellow waistcoat and top-boots, who was a farmer as well as an innkeeper, met her at the entrance.
“Mary ain’t quite so well, miss,” he began, more hastily than he was in the habit of speaking. She’s lying down. I’m afeared I can’t ask you to go up this afternoon.”
“I have not come to see her,” returned Georgina, ignoring ceremony. “Is Mr. Frederick St. John here?”
The man seemed taken back. He might not admit it; he could not conscientiously deny it; and he only stared by way of answer.
“I know he is here,” said Georgina. “You need not hesitate.” —
“Well, miss, he is here, and that’s the truth. But I mightn’t say it.”
“I want to see him,” she continued, walking into the family parlour, then vacant. “Ask him to come to me.”
It appeared that he could not come without his attendant in the curious hat, for when Mr. St. John, who came down immediately, entered the room, that gentleman’s hat and head appeared over his shoulder. Very haughtily Mr. St. John waved him off, and closed the door to shut him out.
“Georgina, what brings you here?”
“How did it happen?” she asked eagerly. “Are you really arrested?”
“Really and truly,” he said, speaking in a tone of hauteur that perhaps veiled a feeling of bitter mortification. “The marvel does not lie in that, but in how you came to know of it.”
“I guessed it,” said Georgina.
“Guessed it!”
She quietly told him the whole from the beginning: her meeting with the man in the morning, the news Mrs. St. John brought about the note, the fancied view of Lady Anne.
“The truth seemed to come over me in a moment,” she concluded. “I knew you were arrested; I was sure it was nothing else. And I ran all the way here to ask if I can do anything for you. I saw by the note that you dare not tell Mrs. St. John.”
“Dare is not quite the word, Georgina. If I can spare her I will do so, for I know it would grieve her cruelly. The affair would not have been the trouble of a quarter-of-an-hour, but for Isaac’s being away. Things always do happen by contraries.”
“You think he would — he would — what could he have done?” she asked, her anxious face and its earnest eyes turned up to him.
“He would have paid the claim and set me free. As it is, nothing can be done until he comes home to-morrow.”
“How much is the claim?”
Frederick St. John drew in his lips. “It is amidst the hundreds. Nay, how scared you look! It was a clever trick, their sending the fellow down here after me.”
“Who is he?” asked Georgina, lowering her voice, with an instinctive conviction that the individual in question was rather near the outside of the door.
“He’s nobody,” was the reply. “But, nevertheless, he is master of me just now, by virtue of the law. He considers himself a model of consideration and benevolence, and will expect me to acknowledge it substantially: otherwise he would have taken me off pretty quickly.”
“Where to?”
“To — it is an ugly word, Georgina — prison.”
“Oh! But you will stop that, won’t you?”
“Isaac will. The annoying part of the business is, that he should be away just this day of all days. It is rather singular, too, considering that he is at home from year’s end to year’s end. There’s no help for it, however, and here I must stop until he does return, hiding myself like a mouse, lest I should be seen, and the news carried to my mother.”
“Can’t I help you? — can’t I do anything for you?”
“Thank you always, Georgina. You are a good little girl, after all. No, nothing.”
She pouted her pretty lips.
“Except keep the secret. And go home again as soon as possible. What would your mamma say if she knew you had come?” he asked.
“Scold me for a week. Will Mr. St. John be home early to-morrow?”
“I wish I knew. Any time, I suppose, from midday up to night. We must set some one to watch for him. He is posting, and therefore goes and comes the upper road, not passing here. I dare not send a note to Castle Wafer to await his arrival, for my mother, seeing my handwriting, would inevitably open it; neither can I entrust the matter to any of the servants to inform their master: they might make a mystery of it, and so bring it in that way to the ears of my mother. Besides, to tell the truth, I don’t care that the servants should know of it. Brumm alone would be safe, and he is with his master.”
“Entrust it to me,” said Georgina, eagerly. “Let me manage it for you. I will take care to tell Mr. St. John the moment of his arrival. If I can’t see him, I’ll tell Brumm.”
Mr. St. John paused a minute. The proposal certainly solved a difficulty.
“But I don’t like you to do this, Georgina,” he said, following out his thoughts.
“I will do it,” she answered, the colour mantling to her cheeks. “You can’t prevent me now.”
He smiled at her eagerness; he saw how pleasant it was to her to serve him. She laid her hand on the door to depart.
“Be it so, Georgina. I shall call you henceforth my friend in need.”
She opened the door quickly. On the opposite side of the narrow passage, his back propped against the wall, a cautious sentinel, stood the man. Mr. St. John saw him, closed his lips on what he was about to say, and mo
tioned her into the room again.
“You will not speak of this misfortune, Georgina, at your own house? Is it known there?” he continued, a sudden fear betraying itself in his voice. “Does Sarah know of it?”
“And if she did,” retorted Georgina, the old pain seizing upon her heart again, “she does not know of it from me.”
Throwing back the door, she went straight out of the house, running all the way home lest she should be missed, her brain busy with the one thought.
“Sarah, Sarah! It is all he cares for in life!”
CHAPTER XII.
THE FAIR AT ALNWICK.
IN the long, straggling street, which chiefly comprised the village of Alnwick, there was a break in the houses on the left-hand side. This was filled up by the common, or waste land; it belonged to the lord of the manor, and no one might build upon it. It was a wide, untidy piece of ground, branching off into far-away corners and dells, which did very well for harbouring trampers and gipsies. Once a year, for three days in September, this common was delivered over to all the bustle and confusion of a fair. Shows and booths, containing (if you could believe them) the wonders of the world, living and dead; caravans; drinking-tents; stalls for fruit, gingerbread, and penny trumpets; and here shoals of pleasure-seekers reigned in triumph during those three days. Sober shopkeepers, driven half wild with opposition drums and horns, talked a great deal about “getting the nuisance done away with;” but the populace generally believed that no man living could put the threat into execution, except the lord of the manor: and he could only do it by refusing the use of the ground. However that may have been, the ground had not been refused yet, and the populace was triumphant.
It was a bright September day, and the fair was in full glory; as far as was consistent with the comparative quiet and respectability of the first day. Things on that day were ordered with a due regard to decorum: the music was kept within bounds, the bawling showmen were subdued and persuasive, the ladies’ dresses and dancing were gentility itself. For on this first day the better families around would send their children to the fair (some had been known to go to it themselves), and ladies’-maids and butlers congregated there in great force. The second and third days were given over to what these domestics called the riff-raff.