And was this the being his honourable, graceful-minded, gentlemanlike old friend was about to plant in the halls of his ancestors as the representative and continuer of his race? There was something in the idea which grated painfully on the feelings of the young adviser. Were this, to him most unattractive person, the best, or the only one, with whom Mr. Thorpe could claim kindred, Sir Charles Temple inwardly assured himself that he would, to the very utmost of his power, have palliated her detestabilities to her uncle, to himself, and, as far as possible, to all others: but with two such creatures as the young Heathcotes before his eyes, such a selection was intolerable; and he was determined to be ready with all the arguments that good taste and common sense could furnish, in order to set right the judgment that seemed in danger of going so very lamentably wrong.
As these thoughts irked and worked him, he covertly studied the countenances of the two girls who sat opposite to him. Florence, the very perfection of young ingenuousness and feminine grace; Sophia, the compact, terse, little abstract of what was precisely the reverse; and then he turned his eyes to Mr. Thorpe to see if he looked mad enough to render such blundering possible.
More than once, indeed, he persuaded himself that the idea fleas altogether unfounded, and muttered the word “Nonsense!” with very satisfactory energy; yet, from time to time, he could not help remarking that the old gentleman’s attentions were all for her. His own hymn-book, opened at the right page, was regularly put into her hand when the rustic choir stood up to
“praise the gods amiss.”
It was to her stumpy little feet that he stooped down to arrange a hassock; and it was to her, and to her only, that he offered his arm when the service was over, and the party set off on their return home.
The manner, too, in which the neat-looking little Miss Martin received these attentions, irritated the feeling’s of the sensitive baronet quite as much as the attentions themselves. The mixture of disclaiming humility and ardent gratitude, — the retiring shyness at one moment, and the creeping, cat-like caressingness at another, shook his serenity to its very centre; and when the whole circle were again assembled round the fire on their return, and he noted anew the combing of the stiff curls and the fall of the shirt-collar, so strikingly like the well-remembered portrait, he felt as if he could have thrown her out of the window with very particular satisfaction.
The Christmas-day passed as Christmas-days generally do, with more mirth in the kitchen than in the parlour, but a good deal of eating in both. When the company were assembled in the drawing-room after dinner, however, Mr. Thorpe seemed to consider it necessary that some effort more than ordinary should be made for their amusement, but apparently knew not very well how to manage it. First, he proposed a round game; but it was speedily evident that neither Major nor Mrs. Heathcote considered it particularly desirable for the young people. He then inquired if they had any predilection for Blind-man’s-Buff? But upon this proposal the Welsh heiresses put a very decided negative, giving, at the same time, a glance at the blonde trimming of their dresses which ought to have made the ex-ambassador ashamed of himself.
“Well then, my dear children,” said the discomfited purveyor of sports and pastimes, “if you are all too much grown-up for that sort of thing, you must give us all the merriest songs you can think of: — and then, perhaps, you may dance a reel, or something of that kind.”
“Let us waltz!” said Mr. Bentinck Spencer.
“Will you waltz with me, cousin Florence?” said Mr. Montagu, suiting the action to the word by drawing near her, and putting on his gloves at the same moment.
It was evident, indeed, that this last proposal was likely to obtain considerable favour, for the official Mr. Spencer himself condescended to say to Miss Winifred Wilkyns, “Shall I waltz with you, my dear?”
But, alas! this gay scheme did not answer, eventually, better than those proposed by Mr. Thorpe, for both Florence and Algernon declared that they had never seen waltzing in their lives, and did not know what it meant; and the three Misses Wilkyns, though they avowed a very passionate love for the exercise, declared that for that very reason there was not one of them could play a waltz. “We know better than that,” observed the eldest sister: “the moment girls are known to play waltzes, hey are never left in peace to dance them.”
“And I don’t suppose, my dears, that either of you two have given much time to music as yet?” said Mr. Thorpe, addressing himself to Miss Martin and Florence.
“I hardly ever saw a piano-forte before,” replied Florence, laughing.
Sophia sighed deeply, shook her head, and then turned it away for a moment, as if ashamed to meet her uncle’s eye; but at length answered, “I do love music so very much, that, I think, if I could ever have been taught, I might have played.”
“No doubt about it, my dear girl, no doubt about it. And if you are so very fond of it, I don’t see that it would be too late now,” said Mr. Thorpe, his eyes almost involuntarily fixing themselves upon those dear stiff curls, which now again stood, hair by hair, as it seemed, in the self-same form and fashion as those he Had best loved. “But without being able to play, you may give us a Christmas carol, Sophy. Don’t you know any pretty songs, my dear?”
Now, the truth was, that if the life of Sophia Martin had depended upon her distinguishing the difference between the “Dead, March” and “Let’s hie to the Wedding,” the chances would have been greatly against her ears being able to save her from the tomb. But yet, when she answered this demand by replying, “Oh no! uncle, not for all the world!” nobody unacquainted with the fact would ever have guessed it, or attributed her gentle silence to anything but timidity.
For some reason or other, however, Sir Charles Temple suspected the fact; — perhaps a very slight glance from Algernon’s bright eye might have helped him to it. But, at any rate, he was disposed to make an experiment; and quietly placing himself in a chair behind Florence, with whom he had established a comfortable, friendly sort of acquaintance, he said, “I have a great favour to beg of you, Miss Florence: will you grant it?”
“Yes, that I will,” she frankly replied, with a smile as cordial as her words.
“Thank you for the promise! All I ask is, that should your uncle Thorpe request you to sing, you will let him hear ‘Hark! The lark’.... as I heard it in the woods the other day.”
Having said this, Sir Charles waited for no farther parley wisely considering that as the young lady had already given him her promise, he might lose, but could not gain further advantage by listening to anything more she might wish to say.
The baronet then betook himself to his old friend, and whispered in his ear, “Ask Miss Heathcote, sir — I know she can sing, for I have heard her.”
“Indeed!.... But I think you must be mistaken, Temple. She told me she had never seen a piano-forte. You probably overheard one of the Welsh ladies.”
Sir Charles smiled slightly at the notion of his mistaking a Wilkyn’s voice for that of Florence; but gravely assured Mr. Thorpe that such was not the case, as he would be quite aware if he would lay his commands upon his youngest niece to give them a song. Thus urged, the old gentleman approached her, and said, “Now, niece Florence, I dare say when I tell you to sing to me, you will reply that you cannot sing, any more that your cousin. — That is what you are going to say, is it not?”
“No, uncle,” replied Florence, colouring.
“indeed! Then what will you say?”
“That I don’t suppose I sing well enough for you to like it very much’; and, therefore, that I think it would be better for me not to try before so many people, — but that if you bid me do it, i will.”
“And a very good answer it is, Florence. And now, my dear, I will bid you sing. Perhaps your cousin Wilkyns will be good enough to play for you?”
“Oh, certainly!” said the accomplished Elfreda, hastening to place her fingers on the instrument. “What shall it be, Miss Heathcote?”
“Whatever you please,” repl
ied Florence, innocently, and with very joyful alacrity; for though quite determined not to break the promise she had given to Sir Charles, she was exceedingly well pleased at the idea of escaping it.
“Whatever I please!” repeated Elfreda, with a slight sneer. “Upon my word, that is undertaking a good deal. However, I will give you something very pretty.” And having obligingly given this promise, she placed one of Signor Catamari’s most prodigious bravuras upon the desk, and began to flourish hep way through it with great apparent satisfaction. Florence, meanwhile, remained in her place listening, and though the sounds she heard did not inspire her with any very thrilling sensations of delight, she too was exceedingly well pleased, for just at that moment she greatly preferred hearing Miss Wilkins perform to performing herself. As to the offer of accompaniment to her singing, she no more understood it than the birds would have done, to whom her step-mother had not unaptly compared her.
Miss Wilkyns left her in peace during Mr. Catamari’s long, long symphony, though not, perhaps, without some little feeling of disgust at her not having eagerly placed herself beside the instrument the instant her own gracious promise had been uttered; but when she arrived at the air, and perceived that Florence still quietly retained her place, she waxed extremely wroth.
“Upon my word, Miss Heathcote,” she said, tossing her rose-crowned tresses; “upon my word, this is treating me very cavalierly. If, after your assurance that you could sing everything, you happened to discover that of what I played you knew nothing, it would have been but civil if you had told me so. It is not very often, I assure you, that I consent to accompany anybody but my sisters; and when I do, it is quite new to find myself treated in this way,”
That Miss Wilkyns was very angry, and that this anger was excited by something she herself had done or left undone, was unmistakably visible to poor Florence; but in what the offence consisted, she knew no more than the babe to be born a dozen centuries hence. There was something laughable, but pretty too, in the simplicity with which, in reply to this startling attack, she said, “Do you mean me, Miss Wilkyns? What is it you wanted me to do?”
“Wanted you to do?... Upon my word, Miss Heathcote, I had neither wants nor wishes on the subject.”
“No more had Florence, Miss Wilkyns,” said Mrs. Heathcote, with so very good-humoured a smile, that nobody could be angry with her. “She neither wanted nor wished, I am very sure, that anybody should trouble themselves to play to her singing. God bless you, her voice has music enough in it, and plenty, without troubling you or anybody to help her... And it so happens that she never had anybody play to her in her life.”
“Your young cousin did not quite understand you, my dear,” said Mr. Thorpe, “so you must please to excuse her; she has not received a regular musical education, as you have; but I dare say, by what her kind mamma says about her, that we shall find her ‘wood-notes wild’ very agreeable. Come, my dear Florence, sing away, there’s a good girl.”
This was a sort of preluding which most young ladies would have preferred being spared, but Florence took it in excellent part, only saying, laughingly, before she began her song, “Please, uncle, you must not listen to all mamma says about me, or you will be sadly disappointed. But I am quite ready to sing as well as I can.”
And without waiting for farther orders, the clear, sweet voice of the untaught girl uttered the beautiful notes and the beautiful words Sir Charles Temple had asked for.
The three Misses Wilkyns looked furtively among themselves, from one to the other, and it seemed to be with great difficulty that they prevented themselves from laughing Mr. Thorpe appeared to be both surprised and pleased, and said kindly, “I beg your pardon, fair niece; but despite your caution, I shall henceforth most assuredly listen to all that it may please your mamma to say of you — for I find that she may be very safely trusted.” Mr. Wilkyns, of course, said nothing; but Mr. Spencer remarked, that it really was a great pity Miss Heathcote should not take a few lessons; and Sophia Martin observed, that never, no never in her whole life, had she seen cousin Florence take so much pains about singing.
Sir Charles Temple, meanwhile, looked and listened considerably more than was advisable for the continuance of the even-minded tranquillity which it had been his wont to enjoy. To a mind less unsophisticated, and more blasé, than his own, it is likely enough that the extreme ignorance displayed by Florence of all things which accomplished people are taught to know, would have revolted him, from the decidedly Agnes-like air which it gave her. But to him this simplicity was delightful; and reading as he did, in the deep tranquil blue of her beautiful eye, a spirit as bright in its thoughts as it was spotless in its purity, he saw, or fancied he saw, in her, the only woman he could ever wish to make his wife. But how could he make a Lady Temple of the penniless Florence, without exposing her to privations which it would wring his heart to see? He must be a wretch only to dream of such a wish! It could not, must not be thought of! He would but go through the task to which he had pledged himself, and then resolutely determine to see her, and to think of her no more.
Sir Charles, good young man! was so perfectly and honestly in earnest as he took this resolution, that he gave himself, with a safe conscience and a gay spirit, to the enjoyment of whatever agree-abilities might intervene before it was necessary to act upon it; and accordingly, Florence had no sooner finished one song than he began asking her for another. In singing the first time among all her strange near relations, she had done what was disagreeable to her, in order to please dear Algernon’s kind new friend, Sir Charles Temple; but after this first time, she did not care about it at all. She was so accustomed to sit at her work, or walk in the fields, and warble away to father, mother, brothers and sisters, for hours together, that she had not the slightest consciousness of showing herself off, or of doing anything at all out of the common way, by sitting close to her good step-mother, on the sofa, with Algernon on the other side of her, and Sir Charles Temple in front, singing away whatever songs they asked for, with the most happy freedom from all restraint, and with a feeling of enjoyment almost as great as she inspired in those who listened to her.’
“Has she never had anybody to sing with her, Mrs. Heathcote?” asked Sir Charles.
“No, never in her life. She learns the tunes by her father’s playing them to her on his flute.”
“The Major is a musician, then?”
“Not very much. But when he was a young man quartered about, with little to do, he used to while away the time, now and then, by taking lessons from one of the band; but he would have given it up long ago, I take it, if it had not just been for the pleasure of teaching a new tune now and then to Florence. She has a pretty pipe, sir, hasn’t she?”
“I think she has, Mrs. Heathcote,” replied the baronet, very demurely. “And I was thinking, that as I sing too, sometimes and know a great many of her songs, I could sing a second to her, if she would let me.”
“Let you, Sir Charles? Oh, goodness! She would be delighted! Wouldn’t you, Florence? Not that she knows anything about singing in parts, Sir Charles, but she is such a quick girl about tunes, and time, and all that, the Major says, that I don’t think she would be likely to put you out in any way. What do you say, Florence? Should you not like to try?”
At this moment, poor Florence, for the first time in her life, felt unchildishly shy. Of herself, as having any claim upon anybody’s admiration, she had never yet been taught to think at all; but she did think Sir Charles Temple was a very great man, notwithstanding all his good nature, and she blushed very brightly, as she replied, “Oh no, mamma! I don’t think I could do that!” Poor Sir Charles! It was very much against him, that blush, and the pretty air of embarrassment which accompanied it. It is quite certain that Florence never looked so beautiful before, and it did seem unfortunate, under his peculiar circumstances, that he should be the first person exposed to the enchantment arising from this first symptom of transition from childishness to womanhood. For a minute or two he see
med quite to have forgotten his offered second, and indeed, everything else, excepting just what he was looking at, but a distinctly audible little titter from a group at the other end of the room, formed by the three Misses Wilkyns, and the two young Messrs. Spencer, appeared to change the course of his feelings, for he got up and walked out of the room.
“I wonder, Florence, if Mr. Thorpe would think it rude of me, if I was to bring down my work-basket?” said Mrs. Heathcote, looking towards the card-table. “What d’ye think of it, my dear?”’
“Think, mamma?” returned Florence looking up in her face with the most unmeaning expression of countenance imaginable.
“Why, to be sure, my dear, you can’t be much judge in such matters. — And now I think of it, Florence, it won’t do, of course, on Christmas-day, because it would not be looking like holiday, time, as it ought to do. — But now that dear, kind Sir Charles Temple is gone out of the room, we three do seem to be left to ourselves, don’t we? and that makes one want something to do.”
“Want something to do, mother?” said Algernon, in a whisper. “How can you want anything to do, when you can watch Sophy Martin’s clever way of playing her game.”
“Nonsense, Algernon! I can’t see her game here, nor you either?”
“Can’t I, mother?” returned the boy; “I think I can.” And as he spoke, he fixed his eyes so earnestly upon her, that Mrs. Heathcote mechanically looked in the same direction; and she saw the young lady, who was now the partner of her uncle Thorpe, looking up in his face with a mixture of such tender devotion and venerating respect, that she exclaimed, “Poor girl! I suppose she is terribly frightened.”
Collected Works of Frances Trollope Page 291