by Ellen Wood
At that moment, the gate behind us opened, and a gentleman came in. We turned round to see who was arriving so late. A stranger. Some good-looking fellow, with auburn hair, a beard that shone like soft silk in the sun, and a bronzed face. To judge by his movements, he was struck with surprise at sight of the gay company, and stood in evident hesitation.
“Oh, Johnny!”
The low, half-terrified exclamation came from Edna. I turned to her. Her eyes were strained on the stranger; her face had turned white as death. He saw us then, and came towards us. We were the nearest to him.
“Do you know me, Edna?”
I knew him then: knew his voice. Ay, and himself also, now that I saw him distinctly. Edna did not faint; though she was white enough for it: she only put her hands together as one does in prayer, a joyous thankfulness dawning in her eyes.
“Frederick?”
“Yes, my darling. How strange that you should be the first to greet me! And you, Johnny, old fellow! You have grown!”
His two hands lay for a time in mine and Edna’s. No one had observed him yet: we were at the end of the lawn, well under the trees.
“More syllabub, Edna!” shrieked out that greedy young Charley.
“And me want more, too,” added little Miles; “me not had enough.”
Edna drew her hand away to go to the table, a happy light shining through her tears. Fred put his arm within mine, and we went across the grass together.
The first to see him was Mr. Brandon. He took in the situation at once, and in a degree prepared Mr. Westerbrook. “Here’s some bronzed young man coming up, Westerbrook,” said he. “Looks like a traveller. I should not be surprised if it is your nephew; or perhaps one who brings news of him.”
Old Westerbrook fell back in his chair, as Fred stood there with his two hands stretched out to him. Then he sprang up, burst into tears, and clasped Fred in his arms. Of all commotions! Mr. Brandon walked away out of it into the sun, putting his yellow silk handkerchief on his head. The Squire stared as if he had never seen a bronzed man before; Tod came leaping up, and the best part of the company after him.
“Edna, Edna!” called out Mr. Westerbrook, sitting back in his chair again, and holding Fred tightly. “Edna, I want you instantly.”
She advanced modestly, blushing roses, her hat held in her hand by its faded strings. Mr. Westerbrook looked at her through his tears.
“Here he is, my dear — do you see? — come back to us at last. We must both welcome him. The homestead is yours from this day, Fred; I will have only just a corner in it. I am too old now for a busy life: you must be the acting master. And, Edna, my child, you will come here to be his helpmeet in it, and to take care of me in my declining years — my dear little daughter! Thank God for all things!”
Fred gave us just a brief summary of the past. Getting over to America without much difficulty, he had sought there for some remunerative work, and sought in vain. One of those panics that the Americans go in for had recently occurred in the States, and numbers of men were unable to get employment. After sundry adventures, and some semi-starvation, he at length made his way to the West Indies. A cousin of his late mother was, he knew, settled somewhere within the regions of British Guiana. He found him in Berbice, a small merchant of New Amsterdam. To him Fred told his whole story; and the old cousin gave him a berth in his counting-house. Office-work was new to Fred; but he did his best; and with the first proceeds of his pay he enclosed the ten pounds to Edna; the house forwarding the letter to their agents in London, to be posted there. Some months later, he chanced to see the advertisement for him in an English newspaper. As soon as he was able, he came off to answer it in person; and — here he was.
“All’s well that ends well,” remarked Mr. Brandon, in his dry way.
“And don’t you go fraternizing with poachers again, Mr. Fred!” cried out the Squire. “See what it brought you to the last time.”
“No, Squire; never again,” answered Fred, pushing back his auburn hair (very long again), with a smile. “This one time has been quite enough.”
“But you cannot have Edna, you know,” said Mrs. Holland to him, with a disturbed face. “The Parsonage could not possibly get on without her.”
“I am afraid the Parsonage will have to try, Mrs. Holland.”
“I shall be obliged to keep my bed; that will be the end of it,” said Mrs. Holland, gloomily. “Nobody can manage the children but Edna. When she is otherwise occupied, their noise is frightful: ten times more distracting than the worst toothache.”
Fred said nothing further; she was looking so ruefully woebegone. Putting his arm into mine, he turned into a shady walk.
“Will you be my groomsman at the wedding, Johnny? But for you, my good friend, I don’t know that I should have been saved to see this day.”
“Nay, Fred, I think it was the key of the church that saved you. I will be your groomsman if you really and truly prefer to pitch upon me, rather than on some one older and better.”
“Yes, you are right,” he answered, lifting his hat, and glancing upwards. “It was the key of the church — under God.”
XVII.
SEEN IN THE MOONLIGHT.
“I tell you it is,” repeated Tod. “One cannot mistake Temple, even at a distance.”
“But this man looks so much older than he. And he has whiskers. Temple had none.”
“And has not Temple grown older, do you suppose; and don’t whiskers sprout and grow? You are always a muff, Johnny. That is Slingsby Temple.”
We had gone by rail to Whitney Hall, and were walking up from the station. The Squire sent us to ask after Sir John’s gout. It was a broiling hot day in the middle of summer. On the lawn before the house, with some of the Whitneys, stood a stranger; a little man, young, dark, and upright.
Tod was right, and I was wrong. It was Slingsby Temple. But I thought him much altered: older-looking than his years, which numbered close upon twenty-five, and more sedate and haughty than ever. We had neither seen nor heard of him since quitting Oxford.
“Oh, he’s regularly in for it this time,” said Bill Whitney, in answer to inquiries about his father, as they shook hands with us. “He has hardly ever had such a bout; can only lie in bed and groan. Temple, don’t you remember Todhetley and Johnny Ludlow?”
“Yes, I do,” answered Temple, holding out his hand to me first, and passing by Tod to do it. But that was Slingsby Temple’s way. I was of no account, and therefore it did not touch his pride to notice me.
“I am glad to see you again,” he said to Tod, cordially enough, as he turned to him; which was quite a gracious acknowledgment for Temple.
But it surprised us to see him there. The Whitneys had no acquaintance with the Temples; neither had he and Bill been special friends at college. Whitney explained it after luncheon, when we were sitting outside the windows in the shade, and Temple was pacing the shrubbery with Helen.
“I fancy it’s a gone case,” said Bill, nodding towards them.
“Oh, William, you should not say it,” struck in Anna, in tones of remonstrance, and with her pretty blush. “It is not sure — and not right to Mr. Temple.”
“Not say it to Tod and Johnny! Rubbish! Why, they are like ourselves, Anna. I say I think it is going to be a case.”
“Helen with another beau!” cried free Tod. “How has it all come about?”
“The mother and Helen have been staying at Malvern, you know,” said Whitney. “Temple turned up at the same hotel, the Foley Arms, and they struck up an intimacy. I went over for the last week, and was surprised to see how thick he was with them. The mother, who is more unsuspicious than a goose, told Temple, in her hospitable way, when they were saying good-bye, that she should be glad to see him if ever he found himself in these benighted parts: and I’ll be shot if at the end of five days he was not here! If Helen’s not the magnet, I don’t know what else it can be.”
“He appears to like her; but it may be only a temporary fancy that will pa
ss away; it ought not to be talked about,” reiterated Anna. “It may come to nothing.”
“It may, or may not,” persisted Bill.
“Will she consent to have him?” I asked.
“She’d be simple if she didn’t,” said Bill. “Temple would be a jolly fine match for any girl. Good in all ways. His property is large, and he himself is as sober and steady as any parson. Always has been.”
I was not thinking of Temple’s eligibility — that was undeniable; but of Helen’s inclinations. Some time before she had gone in for a love affair, which would not do at any price, caused some stir at the Hall, and came to signal grief: though I have not time to tell of it here. Whitney caught the drift of my thoughts.
“That’s over and done with, Johnny. She’d never let its recollection spoil other prospects. You may trust Helen Whitney for that. She is as shallow-hearted as — —”
“For shame, William!” remonstrated Anna.
“It’s true,” said he. “I didn’t say you were. Helen would have twenty sweethearts to your one, and think nothing of it.”
Tod looked at Anna, and laughed gently. Her cheeks turned the colour of the rose she was holding.
“What’s this about a boating tour?” he inquired of Whitney. It had been alluded to at lunch-time.
“Temple’s going in for one with some more fellows,” was the reply. “He has asked me to join them. We mean to do some of the larger rivers; take our tent, and encamp on the bank at night.”
“What a jolly spree!” cried Tod, his face flushing with delight. “How I should like it!”
“I wish to goodness you were coming. But Temple has made up his party. It is his affair, you know. He talks of staying out a month.”
“One get’s no chance in this slow place,” cried Tod, fiercely. “I’ll emigrate, I think, and go tiger-hunting. Is it a secret, this boating affair?”
“A secret! No.”
“What made you kick me under the table, then, when I would have asked particulars at luncheon?”
“Because the mother was present. She has taken all sorts of queer notions into her head — mothers always have them — that the boat will be found bottom upwards some day, and we under it. Failing that, we are to catch colds and fevers and agues from the night encampments. So we say as little about it as possible before her.”
“I see,” nodded Tod. “Look here, Bill, I should like to get up a boating party myself; it sounds glorious. How do you set about it? — and where can you get a boat?”
“Temple knows,” said Bill, “I don’t. Let us go and ask him.”
They went across the grass, leaving me alone with Anna. She and I were the best of friends, as the reader may remember, and exchanged many a little confidence with one another that the world knew nothing of.
“Should you like it for Helen?” I asked, indicating her sister and Slingsby Temple.
“Yes, I think I should,” she answered. “But William had no warrant for speaking as he did. Mr. Temple will only be here a few days longer: when he leaves, we may never see him again.”
“But he is evidently taken with Helen. He shows that he is. And when a man of Slingsby Temple’s disposition allows himself to betray anything of the kind, rely upon it he means something.”
“Did you like him at Oxford, Johnny?”
“Well — I did and did not,” was my hesitating answer. “He was reserved, close, proud, and unsociable; and no man displaying those qualities can be very much liked. On the other hand, he was exemplary in conduct, deserving respect from all, and receiving it.”
“I think he is religious,” said Anna, her voice taking a lower tone.
“Yes, I always thought him that. I fancy their mother brought them up to be so. But Temple is the last man in the world to display it.”
“What with papa’s taking up two rooms to himself now he has the gout, and all of us being at home, mamma was a little at fault what chamber to give Mr. Temple. There was no time for much arrangement, for he came without notice; so she just turned Harry out of his room, which used to be poor John’s, you know, and put Mr. Temple there. That night Harry chanced to go up to bed later than the rest of us. He forgot his room had been changed, and went straight into his own. Mr. Temple was kneeling down in prayer, and a Bible lay open on the table. Mamma says it is not all young men who say their prayers and read their Bible nowadays.”
“Not by a good many, Anna. Yes, Temple is good, and I hope Helen will get him. She will have position, too, as his wife, and a large income.”
“He comes into his estate this year, he told us; in September. He will be five-and-twenty then. But, Johnny, I don’t like one thing: William says there was a report at Oxford that the Temples never live to be even middle-aged men.”
“Some of them have died young, I believe. But, Anna, that’s no reason why they all should.”
“And — there’s a superstition attaching to the family, is there not?” continued Anna. “A ghost that appears; or something of that sort?”
I hardly knew what to answer. How vividly the words brought back poor Fred Temple’s communication to me on the subject, and his subsequent death.
“You don’t speak,” said she. “Won’t you tell me what it is?”
“It is this, Anna: but I dare say it’s all nonsense — all fancy. When one of the Temples is going to die, the spirit of the head of the family who last died is said to appear and beckon to him; a warning that his own death is near. Down in their neighbourhood people call it the Temple superstition.”
“I don’t quite understand,” cried Anna, looking earnestly at me. “Who is it that is said to appear?”
“I’ll give you an instance. When the late Mr. Temple, Slingsby’s father, was walking home from shooting with his gamekeeper one September day, he thought he saw his father in the wood at a little distance: that is, his father’s spirit, for he had been dead some years. It scared him very much at the moment, as the keeper testified. Well, Anna, in a day or two he, Mr. Temple, was dead — killed by an accident.”
“I am glad I am not a Temple; I should be always fearing I might see the sight,” observed Anna, a sad, thoughtful look on her gentle face.
“Oh no, you wouldn’t, Anna. The Temples themselves don’t think of it, and don’t believe in it. Slingsby does not, at any rate. His brother Fred told me at Oxford that no one must presume to allude to it in Slingsby’s presence.”
“Fred? He died at Oxford, did he not?”
“Yes, he died there, poor fellow. Thrown from his horse. I saw it happen, Anna.”
But I said nothing to her of that curious scene to which I had been a witness a night or two before the accident — when poor Fred, to Slingsby’s intense indignation, fancied he saw his father on the college staircase; fancied his father beckoned to him. It was not a thing to talk of. After that time Slingsby had seemed to regard me with rather a special favour; I wondered whether it was because I had not talked of it.
The afternoon passed. We went up to see Sir John in his gouty room, and then said good-bye to them all, including Temple, and started for home again. Tod was surly and cross. He had come out in a temper and he was going back in one.
Tod liked his own way. No one in the world resented interference more than he: and just now he and the Squire were at war. Some twelve months before, Tod had dropped into a five-hundred-pound legacy from a distant relative. It was now ready to be paid to him. The Squire wished it paid over to himself, that he might take care of it; Tod wanted to be grand, and open a banking account of his own. For the past two days the argument had held out on both sides, and this morning Tod had lost his temper. Lost it was again now, but on another score.
“Slingsby Temple might as well have invited me to join the boating lot!” he broke out to me, as we drew near home. “He knows I am an old hand at it.”
“But if his party is made up, Tod? Whitney said it was.”
“Rubbish, Johnny. Made up! They could as well make room for another.
And much good some of them are, I dare say! I can’t remember that Slingsby ever took an oar in his hand at Oxford. All he went in for was star-gazing — and chapels — and lectures. And look at Bill Whitney! He hates rowing.”
“Did you tell Temple you would like to join them?”
“He could see it. I didn’t say in so many words, Will you have me? Of all things, I should enjoy a boating tour! It would be the most jolly thing on earth.”
That night, after we got in, the subject of the money grievance cropped up again. The Squire was smoking his long churchwarden pipe at the open window; Mrs. Todhetley sat by the centre table and the lamp, hemming a strip of muslin. Tod, open as the day on all subjects, abused Temple’s “churlishness” for not inviting him to make one of the boating party, and declared he would organize one of his own, which he could readily do, now he was not tied for money. That remark set the Squire on.
“Ay, that’s just where it would be, Joe,” said he. “Let you keep the money in your own fingers, and we should soon see what it would end in.”
“What would it end in?” demanded Tod.
“Ducks and drakes.”
Tod tossed his head. “You think I am a child still, I believe, father.”
“You are no better, where the spending of money’s concerned,” said the Squire, taking a long whiff. “Few young men are. Their fathers know that, and keep it from them as long as they can. And that’s why so many are not let come into possession of their estates before they are five-and-twenty. This young Temple, it seems, does not come into his; Johnny, here, does not.”
“I should like to know what more harm it would do for the money to lie in my name in the Old Bank than if it lay in yours?” argued Tod. “Should I be drawing cheques on purpose to get rid of it? That’s what you seem to suppose, father.”
“You’d be drawing them to spend,” said the pater.
“No, I shouldn’t. It’s my own money, after all. Being my own, I should take good care of it.”