Works of Ellen Wood

by Ellen Wood

  “Just so,” put in Mr. Angerstyne. “The world was not full of learning then, as it is now, and we accept the language — ay and like it, too — as that of a past day. To me, these old ballads are wonderful: every one has a life’s romance in it.”

  And that day at Holt Fleet, the only time I, Johnny Ludlow, ever saw the place, lives in my memory as a romance now.

  As the days went on, there could be no mistake made by the one or two of us who kept our eyes open. I mean, as to Mr. Angerstyne’s liking for Anne Lewis, and the reciprocal feelings he had awakened. With her, it had been a case of love at first sight; or nearly so. And that, if you may believe the learned in the matter, is the only love deserving the name. Perhaps it had been so with him: I don’t know.

  Three parts of their time they talked together in French, for Mr. Angerstyne spoke it well. And that vexed Julia and Fanny Podd; who called themselves good French scholars, but who somehow failed to understand. “They talk so fast; they do it on purpose,” grumbled Fanny. At German Mr. Angerstyne was not apt. He spoke it a very little, and Anne would laughingly correct his mistakes, and repeat the German words slowly over, that he might catch the accent, causing us no end of fun. That was Anne’s time of day, as Fanny Podd expressed it; but when it came to the musical evenings, Anne was nowhere. The other two shone like stars then, and did their best to monopolize Mr. Angerstyne.

  That a fine gentleman, rich, and a man of the great world, should stay dawdling on at a boarding-house, puzzled Miss Dinah, who knew what was what. Of course it was no business of hers; she and Mrs. Lake were only too glad to have one who paid so liberally. He would run upstairs to sit with Captain Bristow; and twice a week he went to Malvern, sometimes not getting back in time for dinner.

  The college school had begun again, and I was back at Lake’s. For Tom and Alfred Lake, who had been away, were at home now: and nothing would do but I must come to their house before I went home — to which I was daily expecting a summons. As to the bride and bridegroom, we thought they meant to remain away for good; weeks had elapsed since their departure. No one regretted that: Julia and Fanny Podd considered Maythorn Bank the fag-end of the world, and hoped they might never be called to it. And Anne, living in the Elysian Fields, did not care to leave them for the dreary land outside their borders.

  One evening we were invited to a tea-dinner at Captain Sanker’s. The Miss Podds persisted in calling it a soirée. It turned out to be a scrambling sort of entertainment, and must have amused Mr. Angerstyne. Biddy had poured the bowl of sweet custard over the meat patties by mistake, and put salt on the open tartlets instead of sugar. It seemed nothing but fun to us all. The evening, with its mistakes, and its laughter, and its genuine hospitality, came to an end, and we started to go home under the convoy of Mr. Angerstyne, all the Sanker boys, except Toby, attending us. It was a lovely moonlight night; Mrs. Lake, who had come in at the tail of the soirée to escort the girls home, remarked that the moon was never brighter.

  “Why, just look there!” she exclaimed, as we turned up Edgar Street, intending to take that and the steps homewards; “the Tower gates are open!” For it was the custom to close the great gates of Edgar Tower at dusk.

  “Oh, I know,” cried Fred Sanker. “The sub-dean gave a dinner to-night; and the porter has left the gates wide for the carriages. Who is good for a race round the green?”

  It seemed that we all were, for the whole lot of us followed him in, leaving Mrs. Lake calling after us in consternation. The old Tower porter, thinking the Green was being charged by an army of ill-doers, rushed out of his den, shouting to us to come back.

  Much we heeded him! Counting the carriages (three of them) waiting at the sub-dean’s door, we raced onwards at will, some hither, some thither. King went back to Mrs. Lake. The evening coolness felt delicious after the hot and garish day; the moonlight brought out the lights and shades of the queer old houses and the older cathedral. Collecting ourselves together presently, at Fred Sanker’s whoop, Mr. Angerstyne and Anne were missing.

  “They’ve gone to look at the Severn, I think,” said Dan Sanker. “I heard him tell her it was worth looking at in the moonlight.”

  Yes, they were there. He had Anne’s arm tucked up under his, and his head bent over her that she might catch his whispers. They turned round at hearing our footsteps.

  “Indeed we must go home, Mr. Angerstyne,” said Julia Podd, who had run down after me, and spoke crossly. “The college clock is chiming a quarter to eleven. There’s Mrs. Lake waiting for us under the Tower!”

  “Is it so late?” he answered her, in a pleasant voice. “Time flies quickly in the moonlight: I’ve often remarked it.”

  Walking forward, he kept by the side of Julia; Anne and I followed together. Some of the boys were shouting themselves hoarse from the top of the ascent, wanting to know if we were lost.

  “Is it all settled, Anne?” I asked her, jestingly, dropping my voice.

  “Is what settled?” she returned. But she understood; for her face looked like a rose in the moonlight.

  “You know. I can see, if the others can’t. And if it makes you happy, Anne, I am very glad of it.”

  “Oh, Johnny, I hope — I hope no one else does see. But indeed you are making more of it than it deserves.”

  “What does he say to you?”

  “He has not said anything. So you see, Johnny, you may be quite mistaken.”

  It was all the same: if he had not said anything yet, there could be no question that he meant soon to say it. We were passing the old elm-trees just then; the moonlight, flickering through them on Anne’s face, lighted up the sweet hope that lay on it.

  “Sometimes I think if — if papa should not approve of it!” she whispered.

  “But he is sure to approve of it. One cannot help liking Mr. Angerstyne: and his position is undeniable.”

  The sub-dean’s dinner guests were gone, the three carriages bowling them away; and the porter kept up a fire of abuse as he waited to watch us through the little postern-door. The boys, being college boys, returned his attack with interest. Wishing the Sankers good-night, who ran straight down Edgar Street on their way home, we turned off up the steps, and found Mrs. Lake standing patiently at her door. I saw Mr. Angerstyne catch Anne’s hand for a moment in his, under cover of our entrance.

  The morning brought news. Dr. and Mrs. Lewis were on their way to Maythorn Bank, expected to reach it that evening, and the young ladies were bidden to depart for it on the following day.

  A wonderful change had taken place in Dr. Lewis. If they had doubted before whether the doctor was not falling into his dotage they could not doubt longer, for he was decidedly in it. A soft-speaking, mooning man, now; utterly lost in the shadow cast by his wife’s importance. She appeared to be smiling in face and gentle in accent as ever, but she overruled every soul in the house: no one but herself had a will in it. What little strength of mind he might have had, his new bride had taken out of him.

  Anne did not like it. Hitherto mistress of all things under her father, she found herself passed over as a nonentity. She might not express an opinion, or hazard a wish. “My dear, I am here now,” Mrs. Lewis said to her once or twice emphatically. Anne was deposed; her reign was over.

  One little thing, that happened, she certainly did not like. Though humble-minded, entirely without self-assertion, sweet-tempered and modest as a girl should be, she did not like this. Mrs. Lewis sent out invitations for dinner to some people in the neighbourhood, strangers to her until then; the table was too full by one, and she had told Anne that she could not sit down. It was too bad; especially as Julia and Fanny Podd filled two of the more important places, with bunches of fresh sweet-peas in their hair.

  “Besides,” Mrs. Lewis had said to Anne in the morning, “we must have a French side-dish or two, and there’s no one but you understands the making of them.”

  Whether having to play the host was too much for him, or that he did not like the slight put upon his daught
er, before the dinner was half over, the doctor fell asleep. He could not be roused from it. Herbert Tanerton, who had sat by Mrs. Lewis’s side to say grace, thought it was not sleep but unconsciousness. Between them the company carried him into the other room; and Anne, hastening to send in her French dishes, ran there to attend upon him.

  “I hope and trust there’s nothing amiss with his heart,” said old Coney doubtfully, in the bride’s ear.

  “My dear Mr. Coney, his heart is as strong as mine — believe me,” affirmed Mrs. Lewis, flicking some crumbs off the front of her wedding-dress.

  “I hope it is, I’m sure,” repeated Coney. “I don’t like that blue tinge round his lips.”

  They went back to the dinner-table when Dr. Lewis revived. Anne remained kneeling at his feet, gently chafing his hands.

  “What’s the matter?” he cried, staring at her like a man bewildered. “What are you doing?”

  “Dear papa, you fell asleep over your dinner, and they could not wake you. Do you feel ill?”

  “Where am I?” he asked, as if he were speaking out of a dream. And she told him what she could. But she had not heard those suspicious words of old Coney’s.

  It was some minutes yet before he got much sense into him, or seemed fully to understand. He fell back in the chair then, with a deep sigh, keeping Anne’s hand in his.

  “Shall I get you anything, papa?” she asked. “You had eaten scarcely any dinner, they say. Would you like a little drop of brandy-and-water?”

  “Why was not your dress ready?”

  “My dress!” exclaimed Anne.

  “She said so to me, when I asked why you did not come to table. Not made, or washed, or ironed; or something.”

  Anne felt rather at sea. “There’s nothing the matter with my dresses, papa,” she said. “But never mind them — or me. Will you go back to dinner? Or shall I get you anything here?”

  “I don’t want to go back; I don’t want anything,” he answered. “Go and finish yours, my dear.”

  “I have had mine,” she said, with a faint blush. For indeed her dinner had consisted of some bread-and-butter in the kitchen, eaten over the French stew-pans. Dr. Lewis was gazing out at the trees, and seemed to be in thought.

  “Perhaps you stayed away from home rather too long, papa,” she suggested. “You are not accustomed to travelling; and I think you are not strong enough for it. You looked very worn when you first came home; worn and ill.”

  “Ay,” he answered. “I told her it did not do for me; but she laughed. It was nothing but a whirl, you know. And I only want to be quiet.”

  “It is very quiet here, dear papa, and you will soon feel stronger. You shall sit out of doors in the sun of a day, and I will read to you. I wish you would let me get you — —”

  “Hush, child. I’m thinking.”

  With his eyes still fixed on the outdoor landscape, he sat stroking Anne’s hand abstractedly. Nothing broke the silence, except the faint rattle of knives and forks from the dining-room.

  “Mind, Anne, she made me do it,” he suddenly exclaimed.

  “Made you do what, papa?”

  “And so, my dear, if I am not allowed to remedy it, and you feel disappointed, you must think as lightly of it as you are able; and don’t blame me more than you can help. I’ll alter it again if I can, be sure of that; but I don’t have a moment to myself, and at times it seems that she’s just my keeper.”

  Anne answered soothingly that all he did must be right, but had no time to say more, for Mr. Coney, stealing in on tip-toe from the dining-room, came to see after the patient. Anne had not the remotest idea what it was that the doctor alluded to; but she had caught up one idea with dread of heart — that the marriage had not increased his happiness. Perhaps had marred it.

  Maythorn Bank did not suit Mrs. Lewis. Ere she had been two weeks at it, she found it insufferably dull; not to be endured at any price. There was no fashion thereabout, and not much visiting; the neighbours were mostly simple, unpretending people, quite different from the style of company met with in garrison towns and pump-rooms. Moreover the few people who might have visited Mrs. Lewis, did not seem to take to her, or to remember that she was there. This did not imply discourtesy: Dr. Lewis and his daughter had just come into the place, strangers, so to say, and people could not practically recollect all at once that Maythorn Bank was inhabited. Where was the use of dressing up in peacock’s plumes if nobody came to see her? The magnificent wardrobe, laid in during her recent honeymoon, seemed as good as wasted.

  “I can’t stand this!” emphatically cried Mrs. Lewis one day to her daughters. And Anne, chancing to enter the room unexpectedly at the moment, heard her say it, and wondered what it meant.

  That same afternoon, Dr. Lewis had another attack. Anne found him sitting beside the pear-tree insensible, his head hanging over the arm of the bench. Travelling had not brought this second attack on, that was certain; for no man could be leading a more quiet, moping life than he was. Save that he listened now and then to some book, read by Anne, he had no amusement whatever, no excitement; he might have sat all day long with his mouth closed, for all there was to open it for. Mrs. Lewis’s powers of fascination, that she had exercised so persistently upon him as Mrs. Podd, seemed to have deserted her for good. She passed her hours gaping, sleeping, complaining, hardly replying to a question of his, if he by chance asked her one. Even the soft sweet voice that had charmed the world mostly degenerated now into a croak or a scream. Those very mild, not-say-boo-to-a-goose voices are sometimes only kept for public life.

  “I shall take you off to Worcester,” cried Mrs. Lewis to him, when he came out of his insensibility. “We will start as soon as breakfast’s over in the morning.”

  Dr. Lewis began to tremble. “I don’t want to go to Worcester,” said he. “I want to stay here.”

  “But staying here is not good for you, my dear. You’ll be better at Mrs. Lake’s. It is the remains of this paint that is making you ill. I can smell it still quite strongly, and I decidedly object to stay in it.”

  “My dear, you can go; I shall not wish to prevent you. But, as to the paint, I don’t smell it at all now. You can all go. Anne will take care of me.”

  “My dear Dr. Lewis, do you think I would leave you behind me? It is the paint. And you shall see a doctor at Worcester.”

  He said he was a doctor himself, and did not need another; he once more begged to be left at home in peace. All in vain: Mrs. Lewis announced her decision to the household; and Sally, whose wits had been well-nigh scared away by the doings and the bustle of the new inmates, was gladdened by the news that they were about to take their departure.

  “Pourtant si le ciel nous protège, Peut-être encore le reverrai-je.”

  These words, the refrain of an old French song, were being sung by Anne Lewis softly in the gladness of her heart, as she bent over the trunk she was packing. To be going back to Worcester, where he was, seemed to her like going to paradise.

  “What are you doing that for?”

  The emphatic question, spoken in evident surprise, came from her stepmother. The chamber-door was open; Mrs. Lewis had chanced to look in as she passed.

  “What are you doing that for?” she stopped to ask. Anne ceased her song at once and rose from her knees. She really did not know what it was that had elicited the sharp query — unless it was the singing.

  “You need not pack your own things. You are not going to Worcester. It is intended that you shall remain here and take care of the house and of Sally.”

  “Oh, but, Mrs. Lewis, I could not stay here alone,” cried Anne, a hundred thoughts rushing tumultuously into her mind. “It could not be.”

  “Not stay here alone! Why, what is to hinder it? Do you suppose you would get run away with? Now, my dear, we will have no trouble, if you please. You will stay at home like a good girl — therefore you may unpack your box.”

  Anne went straight to her father, and found him with Herbert Tanerton. He had walked ov
er from Timberdale to inquire after the doctor’s health.

  “Could this be, papa?” she said. “That I am to be left alone here while you stay at Worcester?”

  “Don’t talk nonsense, child,” was the peevish answer. “My belief is that you dream dreams, Anne, and then fancy them realities.”

  “But Mrs. Lewis tells me that I am not to go to Worcester — that I am to stay at home,” persisted Anne. And she said it before Mrs. Lewis: who had come into the room then, and was shaking hands with the parson.

  “I think, love, it will be so much better for dear Anne to remain here and see to things,” she said, in that sweet company-voice of hers.

  “No,” dissented the doctor, plucking up the courage to be firm. “If Anne stays here, I shall stay. I’m sure I should be thankful if you’d let us stay: we should have a bit of peace and quiet.”

  She did not make a fuss before the parson. Perhaps she saw that to hold out might cause some unprofitable commotion. Treating Anne to a beaming smile, she remarked that her dear papa’s wish was of course law, and bade her run and finish her packing.

  And when they arrived the next day at Lake’s, and Anne heard that Henry Angerstyne was in truth still there and knew that she should soon be in his presence, it did indeed seem to her that she had stepped into paradise. She was alone when he entered. The others had sought their respective chambers, leaving Anne to gather up their packages and follow, and she had her bonnet untied and her arms full of things when he came into the room. Paradise! she might have experienced some bliss in her life, but none like unto this. Her veins were tingling, her heart-blood leaping. How well he looked! how noble! how superior to other men! As he caught her hand in his, and bent to whisper his low words of greeting, she could scarcely contain within bounds the ecstasy of her emotion.

  “I am so glad you are back again, Anne! I could not believe the good news when the letter came to Mrs. Lake this morning. You have been away two weeks, and they have seemed like months.”