,;(>>.;'. mm':/!'' ■ i-.-.-/VV.'.'VV.'.';!i' KT.'V /l';*.''' ■•/■< ■ i'V'.''-/'.^' ■'■•''■ ' • A^■v'.■]^■.•^ - ■ , :iy^rf'i. Mr ; I / t m li'-i-'^^-^i'-'-vV'' ■ ■ ■'■■ ^'■.>;.'V';;V."'v.''.'".,r •. ^:tt;' ::••■■■:':•■■■■■>:■ ■ ^N'-;---^. ..■■■„ . ' ■ ■ ■. ; ■.■::'.v^:i'•• .\ ^B-'V *■ ■'■■ X.'' :■• *- .*• ■ Wmv.Vy-. ■ ■;•. V. , • ■ f . / c L I E) R.ARY OF THE U N IVLRSITY Of ILLINOIS «3C v.l "•««, FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. S. i-o&tl BY JAMES GEANT, AUTHOR OP "UNDER THE RED DRAGON," "THE ROJIANCE OF WAR'," ETC. IN THEEE VOLUMES. Vol. I. LONDON: TINSLEY BKOTHEBS, 8, CATHEEINE STKEET, STEAND. 1874. [All rights of translation and reproduction are reserved.] LONDON : SWIFT AND CO., EEGENT PKESS, KINft STREET, BEGENT STREET, W. V. I ^ CONTENTS. J I CHAP. PAGE ^^ I. Promoted 1 II. Indecision 13 ^ III. The Shooting Party 32 i\ IV. Why I DID NOT Propose 43 J VI. In the Picture Gallery 70 VII. Drifting 87 ^VIII. * Over Bank, Bush, and Scaur ' . . . 98 t v^ IX. A Night of Alarm 107 ^ X. What Happened ...;.... 114 <<) V. ' Love Not ' 55 4> I. * The Situation had its Charm ' . . . 124 ^ XII. Accepted 136 J>XIII. A Memory of the Crimea 145 OilV. The Sister of Charity 173 vi CONTENTS, CHAP. PAGE XV. Day Dreams 192 XVI. CoNTAiNiNa Something of the ' Old, Old Stoey' 199 XVII. The Cousins ......... .207 XVIII. A Catastrophe Occurs 217 XIX. Henriette's Departure 233 XX. ' Call Me Your Little Wife ' ... 243 XXI. Tilbury Fort 252 XXII. The Punniar 268 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. CHAPTEK I. PROMOTED. **' Prince Consort's Eifle Brigade; Lieu- tenant Lancelot P. Eudkin to be captain, vice Paget deceased." So says the Gazette^' I added, after reading my own name and laying down the Times with a certain emotion of satisfaction mingled with honest regret. * So you are a captain now?' said Henriette Guise, looking up at me with an indescribable smile. * A captain, yes. But poor Paget — I knew him well.' ' What has he died of, think you ?' * Fever, too probably. Every fellow dies of fever where that battalion of ours is quartered at present.' VOL. T. B o FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. 'And shall you join it there ?' she asked, in a sweet clear voice, and with a little anxiety of tone — at least so I flattered my- self. * No ; the battalion to which I shall now belong is up country in India — ^at Allahabad, I think.' * And you must join it there ?' ^ Undoubtedly.' The girl made no answer ; but I could see that her breast heaved softly, her dark lashes drooped, and a little flush crossed her cheek. * Will — will this promotion shorten your leave ?' she asked, after a thoughtful pause that implied a good deal. * Oh, no,^ Circumstanced as Henriette and I were, I felt that she had a right to take a greater interest in my movements and affairs than her simple words expressed, and that this was the time to say a great deal more than these two brief monosyllables ; but many pressing considerations fettered my tongue, and crushed the best emotions of my heart. We were seated in an oriel window of the drawing-room at old Thorsgill Hall. The PROMOTED. evening sun was streaming through it, lighting up the rare beauty of my companion — a beauty which was high in class and very remarkable in character, possessing what some one terms ' the magic of luminous dark- ness ' about it. * But,' says another writer, ' it is sorry work to attempt to describe beauty. Easy enough to write down a list of features, and say that, amalgamated, they look well ; but expression is not to be sought in so many words ; and without expression life is wanting/ In figure Henriette Guise was rather under- sized, and — as she is not my heroine — I may assert with confidence that her general loveli- ness struck one chiefly by its rare quality, and it was purely patrician ; that her form was perfect, and her hands the finest I had ever seen. Her complexion was wonderfully delicate and white, though her hair and eyes were deeply dark, with long black lashes that turned upward at the tips, and strongly de- fined and nearly straight dark eyebrows, that almost met over her delicately-pointed nose; and this imparted great character to her pale oval and animated face. B 2 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. Her eyes, I have said, were very dark; indeed they were a kind of violet-black, if such a term can be used; and they expressed all the purity, goodness, and honesty of heart which were fully hers ; though her short upper lip, which quivered at times when elcited, showed that she was a proud girl, who had a little temper of her own, and with whom it might be unpleasant to have even a lover's quarrel. The summer drills were over, and my comrade Stapleton and I had obtained a few months' leave of absence, two of which I had spent with General Dormer's family circle at Thorsgill Hall, a fine old place near the Tees, where his niece, Henriette Guise, who had completed her education at a fashionable West- end establishment, was now paying a farewell visit previous to rejoining her parents at Calcutta, for which city of palaces she and a cousin were to depart together. For two entire months I had been there, having thus far exceeded what Sir Walter Scott used to term the ' guest-week ' which followed the 'rest- week;' and though there were several other friends in the house, my PROMOTED. ^ intimacy with this most attractive girl had suffered no interruption, save when the General and I threw a line into the Tees, or, after the grouse and ptarmigan shooting began, took a turn over the moors. If I had played much at croquet, it was less for the love of the game than to obtain a glimpse now and then of a taper ankle, a well-bred foot, and a high instep that was suggestive of a good waltzer ; if at chess, I saw less of the figures on the board than the delicate hands and softly-lidded eyes of my com- panion; and when we shot at the archery butts, my arrows flew wide of the target, for ^ I thought only of her rounded bust and arm as she drew the bow, her lithe figure, and wonderful grace. I was then as much in love with her as any man could be mewed up in a somewhat dull country house with such a girl. I had come but to stay a week or two ; yet the time had rolled with marvellous quickness into months ; for the General was an hospit- able old Bengalee, and we had to visit and often picnic at, or near, all the ' lions ' of the neighbourhood, and all the ruins and scenes 6 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. described in Rohehj — Barnard Castle, that overhangs the magnificent valley where the Tees flows through its trench of solid rock ; ^ Egliston's grey ruins,' that tower above the woodlands and the dell called Thorsgill; and Kokeby's glades a-id Mortham's Tower, which, by the way, is haunted by a female spectre ; and often did Henriette and I linger in the famous Kock-walk, and in the bower which was a favourite resort of Scott, in a glen so lonely and romantic that even his pen failed to describe it ; and many a scamper and scratch hurdle-race we had in beautiful Raby Park. In all these expeditions I generally contrived to be the companion of Henriette, who seemed tacitly to expect me to be so, as we had' many tastes and thoughts and emotions in common ; but the time was coming now when these delightful days were to pass and to return no more. Henriette knew and felt that I loved her, and yet I had never told her so. My atten- tions had been such, on a hundred occasions, that, in spite of myself and the guard I had put upon my conduct, she had every reason to expect some declaration ; yet it was never PROMOTED. made — for a stern necessity and a conviction of hopelessness weighed down my heart and sealed the lips that longed to tell its secret. A married sub. might live in India on his pay and allowances, provided that a great staff of ayahs were unnecessary. True, I was a captain now ; but could I ask her to share a bungalow life with me up-country, Heaven knew where ? Could I have kept a house in town, my hunters in the country, and a yacht perhaps at Cowes or Eyde, or even did I possess much less than these pleasant accessories to life in England, I should doubtless have been a much more confident and courageous fellow, and would openly have proposed to the wealthy Indian heiress — for such she was ; but as a captain in the Eifie Brigade, with only a limited allowance besides my pay, and with certain solid anxieties about the contin- gent, batta, and tent age, it was not to be thought of; so there was nothing left for me but to sigh * like a furnace * and be silent. Yet I doubt not my eyes and many a little 8 FAlHi^R THAN A FAIRY. action had spoken eloquently enough; but with such limited funds as compared with her lacs of rupees, as my brother officer Stapleton said, '* it would be the devil and worse, to be cross- questioned by the fair one's papa in the library, or the smug and smoothly- shaved family solicitor, about pro- spects, settlements, and pin-money. 'A captain at five-and-twenty,' thought I (having purchased my lieutenancy), as all these miserable considerations flashed through my mind while gazing anxiously and with ill-concealed admiration on my fair com- panion, who was reclining in an easy-chair, with her dark eyes, shaded by the whitest of hands, fixed — as if she too were lost in thought — on the sunny vistas of the wooded chase that stretched in distance far away towards the Tees. 'Miss Guise,' said I, smiling, and feeling the necessity of saying something, ' you for- got to congratulate me.' ' On having a scene of such distant service before you ?' * Distant ! You forgot that you too are bound for India.' PROMOTED. 9 * True ; for a moment I forgot/ said she, colouring slightly; *but not for some months yet. However, to reside at Garden Eeach is one thing ; to march up-country is quite another/ My spirit fell lower at these words, though doubtless the girl spoke them inadvertently. 'Jungle fever doubtless killed poor Jack Paget/ said I, thinking to excite her interest, and recurring to the Gazette. '1 would rather not have gained my company through his death.' ' He was your friend ?' *We chummed in the same hut before SebastopoL' • ' Was he a nice fellow ?' *Nice is scarcely the term. Miss Guise; he was the king of all good fellows, and moreover a brave officer, who won the Vic- toria Cross at the storming of the Kedan, when he served with the ladder-party.' * Then you are sure this promotion does not shorten your leave ?' she asked after a little pause. 'Yes,' said I briefly, as when she had asked the question before. 10 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. * I am SO glad of that,' she obseiTed, with such genuine earnestness that I was tempted to take her hand in mine and say something decidedly rash, when she hastily added, * So glad — because — because — ' ' Of what, Miss Guise ?' I asked, lowering my voice, while my heart beat very fast indeed. ' You will see my cousin Blanche Bingham before you leave. She is a delightful girl, and everybody loves her. She comes to stay here until we sail together for India. We are the dearest friends in the world, and were boarded together in the same school in London, and were inseparable ; we sat next each other at meals, studied side by side at the same desk ; we practised the same duets, read the same books, and shared the same room, and indulged in all that romantic friendship so peculiar to young ladies in general, and schoolgirls in particular.' * Until one finds a lover — when it ends.' ' Perhaps so,' she replied, growing, if pos- sible, paler this time ; ' but I am so glad that you will see her.' ' Why specially so ?' PROMOTED. 11 * She is so beautiful.' * But we may meet in India,' said I, feeling somewhat disappointed that this was her sole cause for satisfaction that my leave of absence remained intact. ' Scarcely,' she replied, laughing, and showing a brilliant set of teeth ; * India is a wider world than Europeans have any idea of. At her last ball in London, Blanche was considered the loveliest girl in the room,' * Were you there ?' * Yes.' ' Indeed, I could not have thought it.' * Now don't attempt flattery,' said she, hold- ing up a tiny forefinger ; ' for even in a stupid country house it is intolerable. But there rings the bell to dress for dinner, so to punish you I shall retire at once.' And with a very sweet smile she bowed^ and left me. As her figure disappeared through the cur- tained arch of the outer drawing-room, a sigh of impatience escaped me. *No, no,' thought I, while slowly retiring to my room to make the necessary changes in my toilette, * it cannot — must not be ! 12 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. This affair of ours must be deemed only a flirtation, like any other -a flirtation to pass away, but I fear it will be a hard one to for- get. Would to heaven that I had never never come near Thorsgill Hall !' ( IB ) CHAPTEK II. INDECISION. Two lively London girls and their brother Bob Howard, a somewhat priggish young ^barrister, formed a portion of the circle at the Hall ; but as they have no share in my story, they need not be more particularly referred to ; but Colonel Stapleton — Jocelyn Smyth Stapleton — as his cards had it — who came with me from Tilbury, requires some description, as the reader will hear a good deal of him at a future time in these pages ; and it must be borne in mind that we were not friends but acquaintances only, who had come together on the General's invitation. Though not quite six feet in height, he was a tall and splendidly-made man, and had a very fair complexion, though it had been somewhat reddened by the Indian sun. His face was handsome, with regular features. 14 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY, and he was closely shaven, all save a thick light-brown moustache, which concealed a mouth that was so formed as to express both cruelty and hauteur, if not insolence. His eyes were a cold and pale dull grey. In manner he was calm, cool, refined, and ap- parently unimpressionable, though there were times when he assumed an air of insouciance that was somewhat repellent. Yet ladies admired the Colonel, and gene- rally liked his society, though he made no secret of the fact that he * was not a marrying man.' He had won a reputation for courage, and was said to have done some dashing things (though no one knew precisely what they were) under Gough and Hardinge, when a sub. in the campaign on the Sutlej. At dinner that evening I was congratu- lated by him on my promotion, and by our host, the General — a fine hearty old soldier, who had made more by indigo-planting than by his sword in India, though fond of boast- ing about Chillianwallah, the only battle he ever saw, and who had now settled down into an easy-going country squire and lead- ing man of the district. INDECISION. 15 The Colonel used but a few well-bred words, and turned to address Miss Guise ; but the old General shook me heartily by the hand, while the butler poured out a libation of sparkling Moselle 'to wet' the new commission. By the little Misses Howard, whom the Colonel treated very patronisingly — for he was a blase man of the world in his fortieth year — he was viewed quite as a hero ; for true it is that * no love-broker in the world can prevail more in man's commendation with women than the report of valour;' while his languid mien, and the industry with which he tugged his long tawny moustache, evidently had a great charm for them, though I could perceive that Hen- riette Guise and her aunt, Mrs. Dormer — a pleasant and motherly matron who had seen much of the world in the upper pro- vinces — smiled covertly at his bearing, while I flattered myself that I was somewhat of a favourite with the old lady, chiefly perhaps because her son. Jack Dormer, was brother- ofiicer of mine in the Eifle Brigade. How sadly my mind wavered ! 16 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. Half an hour ago I had silently resolved — yea, had vowed — to relinquish and forswear all hope of winning Henriette, and added the fervent wish that I had never set foot in Thorsgill Hall ; tormented too by hints the unwary General had more than once let fall, to the effect that her parents were as ambitious as they were wealthy, and had certain high views concerning her future in India. If I remained silent, and buried my hopes in my own heart, might not another, no more moneyed or worthy than myself, step in and win the prize, even on the journey out — a journey affording a thousand oppor- tunities to a lover of enterprise ? Amid the hum and routine of the dinner- table, the maze of hot-house flowers and wax-lights, the courses and entrees, and all the slow and stately process of a repast that was somewhat Anglo-Indian in its style, from the caviare to the cura§oa, while con- versing on subjects the most irrelevant, and in which I had not the slightest interest, twenty times I vowed to put all to the issue on the first opportunity — that very night INDECISION, 17 perhaps in the drawing-room or the conserva- tory — to-morrow at latest, and if, refused, would start by an early train for Tilbury. Then, like a very craven, my resolution would wane away and die, till the nervous and very natural dread that another — per- haps Stapleton with his better prospects and superior rank — might supplant me through my own indecision, filled me with jealous bitterness and envy, and made me curse in my heart the ambition of her parents and the inequality of our fortune. Otherwise, how sweet it would have been to abandon myself to the hope of being be- loved by her ! The ladies passed in single file to the drawing-room, and when, after coffee had been drunk as a solemn and indispensable ceremony apparently, we had heard the General's usual reminiscences of Chillian- wallah, anecdotes listened to with undis- guised impatience by the Colonel, and much tugging of his long fair moustache — when, I say, we joined them at last, the night passed uneventfully for me, with music and much singing of the usually vapid kind. VOL. I, g 18 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. I did much in the way of leaf-turning, glove - buttoning, bouquet - holding, and so forth, without having the opportunity I so earnestly sought : and when the time came, I laid my head on the pillow wishing that I had never quitted dull Tilbury by .the turgid Thames to be thrown in the way of this terrible temptation, and conceiving, were it possible, to get up a counter- charm or counterfoil flirtation with some one — Sophy Howard, say — to fill up the time before em- barkation ; but I was past flirting moods now. Then I began to nurse myself into a little fit of jealousy, as Stapleton had somewhat contrived to monopolise my idol for nearly the whole of the evening* He was intimate with her family — would ' the views ' hinted at by the General be concerning him '? Next, it suddenly flashed upon my mind that her little white hand lingered — or it seemed to linger — for a moment in mine, as I bade her farewell for the night ; and in the hunger of my heart I made all that imagination could contrive out of an in- cident so trivial. INDECISION. 19 I had now deferred my fate till next morn- ing, but was late in coming down- stairs ; and entering the breakfast-room, to my annoyance found Stapleton seated by her side, and engaged in the formation of a riding-party to Kokeby Woods with her and the Miss Howards ; while the General had resolutely arranged that their brother, him- self, and I should 'take a turn across the moors, and knock over a few birds.' Miss Guise was not a girl to show her feelings or make scenes, even on important occasions ; but I thought — it might be only fancy — that her quiet dark eyes brightened and their long lashes quivered as I ap- proached and took her hand in mine. So I was doomed to go shooting on this day — the eventful day which I had resolved should see me engaged to the pale, black- haired, and dark-eyed Henriette — engaged till death did us part ; or off to Tilbury Fort, to musketry drill, and teaching * the young idea how to shoot ' with a short Enfield. This excursion to the moors would prove, I knew, in my present mood of mind utter boredom to me ; and, to make matters worse, c 2 20 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. she was to have Stapleton as her cavaher in these lonely woodland glades. So I agreed to accompany the General with a very bad grace. Orders were sent to old Bagshaw, the gamekeeper, to get the guns and dogs in order, while the cattle were to come from the stable-court for the riding party after luncheon ; and I knew that until then, too probably, the Colonel would be in close at- tendance upon Henriette, while I should be stumbling, knee-deep, among the heather at Hindon Edge. The butler had just received his orders when he deposited before the General the despatch-box containing the morning letters ; and, as the arrival of them is always a matter of interest at a breakfast-table in the country, all looked up severally from their coffee and grouse-pie, as he drew forth and distributed the contents. There were pink and yellow epistles, crossed and recrossed, and periodicals, with the latest fashions, for the Miss Howards ; a letter for our host, concerning the county pack and certain melon-frames that had been smashed at the last hunt; *And such a INDECISION. 21 smasli we cannot, to use a Bengal phrase, score down to the flying artillery,' said the General ; and there was one from India, on which the eye of Mrs. Dormer fell im- mediately with solicitude ; thus she did not open her own letters until the former had been hastily perused by her husband. * From Allahabad, is it ?' she asked. * Yes, from Jack.' * Our dear boy is well, I devoutly trust.' * Quite well, Louisa,' said he ; * but he has the usual desire to draw on Coutts and Co., or the Agra, having, as he calls it, *^ lost a pot of money on the Planters' Cup ;" and then he adds,' continued the General, turning' to me, '^ that cholera has broken out in the cantonments, and that the Sepoys are be- coming greatly discontented, somehow, about the substitution of the new rifle -ammunition for the old." This sort of thing never hap- pened in my time, though I remember at Chillianwallah — ' * I have here a letter from Blanche Bing- ham,' said Mrs. Dormer, with nervous haste, for the General's reminiscences of that fa- mous affair were seriously to be dreaded. 22 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. * From Blanche, indeed ! and what is her news ?' ' Shall I read it aloud ?' * Do, please, aunt,' said Henriette ; * her letters are always amusing, and seem so characteristic of herself.' ' '^ My darling aunt Dormer " (such a warm-hearted girl she is !), '^I cannot allow your kind invitation to lie over one moment longer. In the first place, I must acknow- ledge to feeling quite vain on finding how solicitous you are all to see me — the gentle- men, no doubt, especially ; and secondly, that I long very much to be at dear Thorsgill Hall, where, by Henriette's accounts, you seem to be having a remarkably jolly time of it. Our chief excitement here is hunting. We were out three days ago — the Appleton girls and I — with the Brighton harriers, and rode the whole way to the meet with the master of the hounds. Such a handsome man, auntie, though getting grey, and he seemed to admire me immensely, as all the old fellows do. *' We started a hare, which was killed after an eight-miles' run. I was in at the death, INDECISION. 28 and saw the chopping, which shocked me ; for in a moment not a vestige of the poor animal remained but the blood on the dogs' noses. The M. F. H. and a couple of Lancers came to dinner, after which we had limited loo, and unlimited flirtation. At the former I lost horribly, as usual. " Next evening we were all at a concert ; Titiens, as Lucia^ sang divinely, as you may suppose ; but the tenor, as Edgardo, squalled horribly in the churchyard. Yesterday saw lus with the hounds again. We drew a fine fox from some gorse-bushes on the downs, and had a thirty- eight miles' run, without a single check ! Jacky Appleton and I were the* only ladies there. We rushed our horses at everything, yet didn't keep cautiously behind any slow fellow who knew the country, the hedges, lanes, and so forth. The M. F, H. complimented us before the whole field ! The afternoon saw us at a pianoforte recital in the Pavilion. Oh, how slow it was ! just like the conventional small talk of a kettle- drum that followed. *' In the evenings we always ' do ' the Pier, of course. Thither comes Jacky' s admirer 24 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. and slavey, and I found myself playing Mademoiselle de Trop (a role which never suited your affectionate niece), till her mamma picked up for me a stray plunger on leave from Knightsbridge. For this I was thankful, as it is such a dreadful bore 'to superintend the flirtations of others. ** As for poor dear Jacky's admirer, he is only a mild curate whom she caught at croquet; a lisping apostle in a long coat^ with parted hair, and not brains enough to bait a mousetrap, otherwise I should soon have had him all to myself. Jacky's case seems a very bad one, but I don't think it will end either in ' clandestine matrimony or charcoal.' '' Although I am very happy here, and my plunger, ' made up by youth, by love, and by an army tailor,' is very attentive, and every one seems delighted with me, I quite long to be with you all, as my time in Europe is now, alas ! so very short." ' ' She and Henriette go out, with Mrs. Appleton as their chaperone," said Mrs. Dor- mer parenthetically to me. ' *^ Give my love to the Howard girls. INDECISION. 25 Has their brother Bob rejoiced in a brief yet r ' Upon my word, Miss Blanche makes very free ! And here is a message for you, Colonel. * '' I am so glad that Colonel Stapleton is with you. I met him in London at one or two places, where he waltzed divinely, which — which — which — " ' Mrs. Dormer paused with a perplexed air, and coloured percep- tibly. * Please, madam, to finish,' said the person- age alluded to, tugging at his fair moustache. ' *^ Which seems to be the only accomplish- ment he possesses, save playing with hi? moustache, if that be one." ' How can Blanche permit herself to write thus ?' We all laughed at this, and none more heartily than Stapleton himself; however, that he was nettled was evident, as I heard him whisper to Howard : * Gushing young female, by Jove !' ' Anything more ?' asked the General, with mischief twinkling in his eyes. ' Only that she will arrive here this even- 26 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. ing a little before dinner-time, so the carriage must meet her at Winston Station,' replied Mrs. Dormer, closing the letter in haste, as if she had read quite enough. * Glad to hear it,' said the General, rubbing his hands ; ' a dear good girl, and a beautiful one too ! Gad, she'll bring a breeze with her ! Blanche will take the house by storm.' To me the tone of the letter seemed a little too ' fast,' and but ill-calculated to give a favourable impression of the writer. I looked at the quiet, ladylike, and sweetly feminine Henriette, and thought, * Ah, you would never let your pen run on thus.' But I give prominence to the letter here, because the fair writer will figure largely in the pages to come. ' I do not think it was quite just to the young lady, your reading that to me, Mrs. Dormer,' said Stapleton, with one of his noiseless laughs, but letting his moustache alone for once. ' I stumbled on the passage quite suddenly,' replied our hostess. ' And Blanche is somewhat of a privileged INDECISION, 27 rantipole,' added her uncle ; * we don't mind a bit what she says/ * Is it so ?' I asked Henriette, by whose other side I had achieved a seat. ' Perhaps ; there is so much of the mere girl about her still; but with her winning ways, the waxen delicacy of her face and features will, nay must, be sure to charm you.' ' I fear not. Hen — Miss Guise.' * Why ?' she asked, smiling. * Because I have ever had a preference for dark beauty,' said I ; and lightly, and all unseen, I laid my hand on hers for an instant, and once again I saw a little flush, like the tint of a rose-leaf, cross her cheek. * How the time passes !' said the General, as a thoughtful shade flitted over his hand- some old face. ^It seems but yesterday since she and Henriette — my own pet, Henriette ! • — came from India, little pale-faced and bleached, but prattling girls of five years old ; so joyous and so innocent too ! They used to climb from a hassock up my knees to kiss me. Now they are going out full-blown young ladies, to take the hearts of the Europeans 28 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. by storm, and no doubt brides soon to be; for such wares soon find merchants in the Bengal market/ '0 uncle!' said Henriette deprecatingly, as she held up her pretty hands ; * but I do hope that we are innocent still/ she added, laughing, * though '* the years have rolled on," as the domestic novels say.' And, springing from the table, she put round the old man's neck two lovely white and tapered arms, that came softly forth from the loose and lace-trimmed sleeves of a very becoming morning-dress of cerise colour, and kissed him on both cheeks affectionately, while her eyes grew moist. I felt more than envious of the graceful caress, and more than ever solicitous about the proposal I had in view ; more especially as, when she took her arms from her uncle's neck, her eyes first fell with a curious expression on me. What a wonderful power those finely-lidded eyes possessed, and how graceful were all her ways and the action of her small delicate hands ! ' And now for the moors !' said the General, rising. INDECISION. 29 With that glance causing my heart to quicken and throb, and to ban the shooting expedition which caused a fresh delay in my affairs, I ascended to my room to gaiter and accoutre ; which I did in great haste, with the desire of having, perhaps, a parting word with one who was become so dear to me and so necessary to my happiness. The breakfast-table was deserted. She was not in the drawing-room ; but the subdued sound of voices drew me towards the conservatory, which opened off it on the south side of the house. It was long and spacious, and more than one graceful acacia drooped there its featherj? foliage overhead. There were two parallel passages, formed by a high pyramidal stand or frame in the centre ; on this stand was a mass of exotics in full flower. As I passed, almost noiselessly along the grated and matted floor, I paused, for the voices of Stapleton and Henriette fell on my ear, and my sole desire was to withdraw unnoticed ; for to her I had by this time indicated either too much or too little. * Bring me a stephanotis,' said she, * and 30 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. take this for the button-hole of your riding- coat.' 'Oh, a thousand thanks !' he repHed ; *but this — what is it ?' ' A camelHa ; don't you see, Colonel ?' * Here is the stephanotis. Do you know,' he added in his most insinuating tone, ' that what you have asked me for is quite a bridal- flower ?' 'Yes,' said she, laughing, which might have assured me she had no grave or tender thoughts in her heart ; but you have brought with it three rosebuds.' 'Which mean,' he added, 'you know what, in the language of the flowers.' ' A proposal, I believe.' What more followed I know not, as at that moment the General, attired in a rough twead suit, with brown gaiters, and with shot-belt and flask slung crosswise over his shoulders, appeared at the entrance, saying noisily : 'Now, then, Rudkin — Lance, my boy — Howard and I are waiting ; the dog- cart is at the door, and we have a good hour's drive to Hindon Edge.' INDECISION. 31 Then grasping my patent breech-loader, I sprang into the vehicle in a very savage mood of mind indeed, and feeling the while that I was leaving the blase Colonel in full posses- sion of the field. 82 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. CHAPTEK III. THE SHOOTING PARTY. There can be a conversation without words, or in which the words used — though mere commonplace talk — sink deeply into the heart, indicating that which if written would fill ream upon ream of paper. Yet language has been given us for the purpose, too often, of concealing what we feel and what we wish for. I had never told Henriette Guise that I loved her ; so, barely even a pressure of the hand had passed between us. Each time we naet and parted, words only of the commonest greeting and adieu had been spoken, yet our eyes had involuntarily established that silent conversation which says more than any human language can convey ; and more than once it seemed to me as if we had actually looked into each other's hearts. THE SHOOTING PARTY, BS Then why did I linger in doubt and inde- cision ? Why trifle with her and with my- self, because the General had hinted that her parents were ambitious, and * had views ' concerning her ? Alas, I could little foresee how all this was to end, and how a few short days would leave me no longer to be the arbiter of my own destiny ! How skilfully we can torment ourselves ! As we drove through the beautiful wooded country, and past stackyards that teemed with grain, and shorn fields of tawny and rigid stubble, bordered by trees and hedge- rows presenting every variety of autumnal tints — of brown autumn, the evening of the year — my thoughts were all of her I had left behind me. I saw the Colonel — whom I knew to be very insinuating when it pleased him to act so, and, as compared with myself, to be most provokingly wealthy — lingering with her still in the conservatory, or, it might be, hanging over her at the piano ; and in fancy I furnished them with ample conversa- tion, all about themselves of course. Then I drew a picture of the riding party, VOL. I. D 34 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. and Stapleton assisting her to mount, the departure, and he by her bridle-rein, with the confounded stephanotis in his lapel, and his three most significant rose-buds, too probably, in the breast of her dark-blue riding-habit. How well I knew that habit, and the magnificent contour of her neck, bust, and shoulders in it ! All that I heard in the conservatory might only have been banter, which began and ended there — nay, sounded very like it ; but I writhed at the idea that, even in jest, I had been anticipated. And so I dreamed on, amid the uniform patter of the horse's fast-trotting hoofs, and the hum of the wheels with their patent axle-boxes, till suddenly I became aware that the General had been talking to me for some time, all unresponded to, for Howard and the keeper were seated behind us. ' You know I told you how poor Herbert was killed at Attock ?' he was saying. ^ I was first told of it by a Hindoo fakir — a horrid-looking fellow, half naked, and all smeared with white chalk, a gourd slung by a brass chain at his waist, and with a six- THE SHOOTING PARTY. 85 pound shot hung at his neck, by way of a perpetual penance/ ' Where were you then, General ?' I asked with affected interest. * As I have already mentioned, we were on march to Chillianwallah. I had passed a devil of a night in a peepul tope, kept awake by beastly bats, winged foxes, and green bugs (it was the month of January, you know), and by the howls of the jackals foraging for carrion. I believe they knew what the rumble of the artillery-wheels por- tended on the morrow. I breakfasted on a little rice in a lotah, washed down by a glass of brandy-pawnee ; and went to Gough, and told him we had no time to lose if an effective attack was to be made on those Sikh fellows. *"I quite agree with you. Dormer," said he ; **we must overthrow them, and Chillian- wallah shall be the scene of their defeat. Get your column in motion for Dingee." * I was then acting as brigadier in the field. The pink glow which always precedes sunrise in India was just coming in, you know — ' I didn't know, and still less did I care. D 2 36 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. * — when the whole line broke into columns of march. The Sikhs, clad in red, with white flowing head-dresses, came on with their horse-artillery in front, and opened a fire on our line of skirmishers, till I recom- mended Gough — who always took my advice — to get up the light cavalry — ' And so on, and on, till old Bagshaw said : * Here we are, sir, on Hindon Edge.' * Get out the dogs, then.' * The clouds look rather low, and the wind is southerly,' said Howard somewhat appre- hensively, as we alighted. '"We sha'n't have no rain, for all that, sir,' said the veteran gamekeeper confidently; * but I fear the birds are very wild to-day.' The butler had made ample provision for luncheon, as the contents of our picnic basket testified. The dogs, cramped by an hour's confinement, were brought out, and wagged their tails joyously at the familiar sight of the guns, which were now finally looked to. Howard was to accompany the General on one side of the moor, while Bagshaw was to attend me on the other. The barrister THE SHOOTING PARTY. 87 was a somewhat taciturn fellow, yet I knew him to be very observant, and ere we parted, he contrived, quite unwittingly how- ever, to make me feel more uncomfortable than ever. * Why did not the Colonel accompany us ? ' he asked me. * Because he, more pleasantly, elected to ride with the ladies ; and perhaps he wishes to be at home to receive the new arrival.' * Why so?' * He paid her much attention while in town, I understand.' ' I rather think it was to practise a certain duet with her cousin.' * What duet ? ' I inquired. ' One called ^' The Language of Flowers." ' I started on hearing this ; but I remem- bered having seen a piece bearing that title lying on the piano. ' Oh, yes,' he continued, ' that was to pre- cede the ride. Have you not perceived how much he has dangled about her for the last few days ?' ' No, not in the least.' ' To be sure it was generally when you 88 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. were not in the way/ he added with a know- ing smile. At another time I might have been dis- posed to challenge the accentuation of the pronoun, but now I only laughed to conceal my own annoyance at the conviction that something had been going on that I had failed to see, and set off, with old Bagshaw, feeling all the bitterness of those ^trifles light as air,* which to young men afflicted with my then mental malady, are ' confirma- tions strong as proofs of holy writ.' The sport proved to me most dreary and dull, unprofitable and uneventful. The dense dusty heather was nearly knee- deep, and perilously full of old and half- hidden peat-holes, yet through it we toiled manfully, instinctively grasping our guns and looking sharply about us. We were on very lofty ground, and from Hindon Edge, as far as the eye would reach away to the north- ward, the vast extent of purple moorland stretched, all steeped in hazy but golden sunshine. The birds were indeed wild ; for the dogs, steady and persevering, were scouring the THE SHOOTING PARTY, 89 ground at such a distance that they had to be recalled again and again by Bagshaw's whistle and the vicious cracking of his whip ; but it mattered little to me, for I missed every shot, as if bewitched, and the silver- haired gamekeeper held up his brown hands in pitying astonishment to see so much good ammunition expended on thin air without the least result. But my thoughts were elsewhere, and thus, though usually a good sportsman and a trained rifle-shot, as a passed instructor in musketry, not a single grouse was mine, and the whole spoil that accrued to my prowess at the close of the day, greatly to the astonishment and amusement of the General, was one teal of the very smallest size ! Luncheon over — pates de fois gras and pie of boned larks — alas, for the poor bird that sings at heaven's gate, for even it cannot escape the gastronomic necessities of John Bull ! — a long draught or two of champagne, imbibed after the bottles had lain to cool in a deep runnel ; and after hearing the General's report of his success — which 40 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. seemed great, if one might jndge by the distension of his bag, and also the delighted expressions of his legal friend, who had killed several brace of grouse — we separated again to. plod over the moor ; and to me the day passed slowly amid the silence of that purple waste, broken only at times by a distant report, as the General or his com- panion ^ knocked over ' a bird, or by the pitiful whistle of a curlev/. I was glad when the sun began to verge westward, and the Kaby Woods to darken, and we were all once more in the dogcart, and bowling homeward among the shady green lanes, where the yellow ^autumnal leaves lay deep beside the hedgerows. Just as the old facade and pinnacles of Thorsgill Hall came in sight we saw the returning riding party, attended by two mounted grooms wearing orthodox cockades and belts, entering the gate of the avenue, and as my heart foreboded. Colonel Stapleton was with Henriette, the two sisters being left to ride together in their rear ; but, after all, this was not to be marvelled at, as she was certainly a much more attractive girl than THE SHOOTING PARTY. 41 either of the Howards, and as an alternative, decidedly the best. Checking their horses in the avenue, a long and stately line of oaks, they halted till we overtook them ; and then ensued the usual inquiries concerning our sport, with congratulations for those who were fortunate, and I had the additional mortification to find my unlucky teal the object of much laughter, and to none more than Henriette, who seemed in unusually exuberant spirits, and whose veil, as it was lifted by the wind, showed that her normally pale face was flushed with exercise — or was it with pleasure in the Colonel's society ? ' I gathered, however, a little satisfaction from observing that the stephanotis was not in his button -hole, and that the three buds were not in the breast of her habit. Had they been declined, even if offered in jest, or accepted, and then lost during the ride ? Alas, I had no right to inquire. The grooms came up, and the party dis- mounted. Stapleton was off his horse in a moment, and assisted Henriette to alight 42 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. from hex saddle. As he did so, I thought her fingers rested for a moment on his shoulder, and then, giving her his ungloved hand, he led her up the perron to the en- trance-hall, into which, with a smile and a nod to me, she swept with inimitable grace, and with the long skirt of her habit thrown over her left arm. At that moment of petty jealousy and distorted fancy, how little could I foresee the change that was erewhile to come over me, and the cold indifference that for a long, long time at least was to replace the love and admiration which then filled my heart ! ' It can't be possible,' thought I, ' that she can admire a fellow like Stapleton, with his sandy or straw-coloured moustache, large white hands, and pale China-blue eyes — one long since looked upon as '^scratched" in the matrimonial market.' ( 43 ) CHAPTEE IV. WHY I DID NOT PROPOSE. Thorsgill Hall is beautifully situated near an acute bend of the river in the richly - wooded vale through which the Tees flows from Millbourn Forest, on its way to the German Ocean. A house of the Stuart times, that had been battered and burned iu civil war and more than once by Scottish invaders, it had been patched up and re- paired in different ages, thus adding to its picturesque irregularity; and though ex- tremely antique, the older edifice and the more recent additions made thereto in the same style of architecture, with mullioned oriels, were all furnished in light and fashion- able modern taste. It was thoroughly a pleasant home, with an oaken library that was tranquil and quiet with subdued lights, a cosy dining-room with 44 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. warm draperies, long corridors for promenades in wet weather, and a stately double drawing- room, the brightly tinted oriel of which looked out on a noble and far- stretching chase, where the General's ancestors had hunted and hawked in past times, had dallied- with their brides in youth and with their children in old age, and where now the brown deer found a lair among the waving fern. It was not without its quaint legends too, as it had a haunted room in one of its old gable-ended abutments — a room which existed without being seen, for a wicked Squire of Thorsgill in times long past had been carried off there by the devil, with a number of his friends who were gambling deeply, drinking, and swearing profanely on a Christmas -eve, and were never seen more ; but it was averred that in stormy nights, when the Tees was foaming over its rocky bed, when the trees of the chase bent beneath the blast, when their torn leaves and the rain pelted on the oriels, and the wind moaned round the gables and clustered chimney-stacks of the old mansion, the voices, laughter, shrieks, and curses of WHY I DID NOT PROPOSE, 45 the lost gamesters, with the rattHng of dice- boxes, and the cHnk of glasses, were heard in the mysterious room; but the General, who laughed at the story, said that no such thing had happened in his time. The proprietor's Indian tastes and pro- clivities were to be seen on all sides, in the form of Bombay workboxes, Japanese canisters all over flaming red dragons, Bur- mese idols squatted on their hams, and in wonderful things carved in ivory. There too were trophies of our Indian wars — Sikh tul- wars from Chillianwallah, Afghan juzails with inlaid butts ; gilded Mahratta shields with brass orbs, and Goorkha cookries; tigers' skins and skulls — which all told of the home of the retired Anglo-Indian, and consorted curiously with the fashion of the old English mansion — a house of the fighting times, when the Scots were wont to come with axe and spear as far south as the Kere Cross of Stanmore. Having dressed for dinner on the evening after the shooting excursion, I chanced to stroll into the library, where to my surprise and joy I found Henriette, and alone. 46 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. She was seated in the recess of a heavily- curtained bay-window, an open book was in her hands and resting on her lap ; but instead of reading she was gazing listlessly, or as if lost in thought, upon the scenery without. Then, declining behind the hills, the Sep- tember sun was throwing the long purple shadows across the green shaven lawn and the stately trees in the chase, where the white sheep in some places, and the deer in others, after having nestled for hours among the feathery ferns, were rousing themselves for a last feed among the tender grass, and causing the rabbits and hares to glide to and fro like evil spirits. Henriefcte's back was to me, and the soft Turkey carpet enabled me to approach her unheard, till I placed my arms on the top of the high chair in which she was seated, and gazed down on her handsome head, with its wealth of black silky hair, and its straight central division that was milky white, her little dehcate shell-like ears and beautiful neck, which her attire showed to perfection. What her dress was I cannot tell now ; I only remember that with it she wore a black- WHY I DID NOT PROPOSE. 47 velvet body cut somewhat low, but square at the neck and bosom, with a narrow stand- up frill of white lace. She was without ornaments of any kind, save a ring or two ; and her fine hair was coiled round a jet comb, all save one long and negligent tress that fell down her back. And as I continued to gaze with tenderness and admiration, I could see, with every respiration, the swelling of her bosom as it rose and fell. We were alone, and I felt, while all my pulses quickened, that now or never was the time to have that told which I meant to tell. Suddenly she looked up at me with a smile, and said : *Now, Captain Eudkin, were I a nervous young lady, which I am not, your approach unheard might have startled me.' * Pardon me; but I could not help admiring your profile and whole pose, as you sat ; but I fear I am disturbing a pleasant reverie perhaps. Of what were you thinking ?' 'How peaceful the landscape looks, and how pleasant it is to hear the evening chimes coming from the old church-tower in the distance !' 48 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. ' Then you have something of art and poetry in your nature,' I observed, scarcely knowing how to begin, and feehng that I was becoming very commonplace. ' I fear that I have neither,' said she, ' I am rather prosaic and practical.' I could see that her eyes drooped under the unconcealed ardour of my gaze ; that she grew, if possible, paler after one tiny flush crossed her cheek, and that her respirations became quicker. * How far did your ride extend to day ?' I asked after a pause. 'A sixteen-miles' trot, to lovely Langiey Dale. It was truly delightful ; the air was so bracing, and the view at times so ex- tensive !' * How I longed in my heart of hearts to be with you ! But the General insisted on my going to the moors with him.' ' And you were most successful,' said she archly. ' My thoughts and wishes were else- where.' ' Then I would that you had come with us. I — that is, we, all of us — did certainly miss WHY I DID NOT PROPOSE. 49 you/ she added, again looking out on the landscape. I took caressingly in my hand the stray tress, and — as I thought, unseen by her — pressed it to my lips, forgetting as I did so that the shutter-panels of the bay-window were all mirror. *I can see you,* she said, laughing, while her colour heightened and paled again. * It is a very gallant action, no doubt ; but, Captain Eudkin, in these days it is perilous work to pull a lady's back-hair.' By this little action I had certainly ' opened the trenches,' and with all her self-possession Henriefcte seemed nervously conscious of what was most probably to follow. I drew a chair close to her side, and seat- ing myself took her right hand in mine, but she withdrew it, and the action chilled and repressed me. A little awkward pause en- sued, and I was silent when I should have spoken. 'Pardon me if — if I have offended you,' said I, with a sigh that was irrepressible. * Offended me ! Oh, no,' she replied, in a low and breathless voice, and while a VOL. I. E 50 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. beautiful smile spread over her soft and half- averted face she held out her hand to me, and then my heart beat more wildly than ever. Caressing the slender fingers between both my hands, I said, ' Do not turn from me. Miss Guise. Oh, let me look into your eyes !' She then turned to me with a half- startled expression, and I could see the white lids with their long black lashes were quivering perceptibly. * Dear Miss Guise,' I was beginning, ' or will you permit me to say dearest — dearest Henriette — ' ' Here she is in the library, of all places in the world !' exclaimed a merry and impetuous voice close by us, and a young lady in her travelling-dress burst suddenly upon us, threw her arms round the neck of Henriette, and kissed her on both cheeks, in mingled affection and fun. * Blanche!' * How scared you look, cousin !' ' You came upon me so suddenly,' said Henriette. WHY I DID NOT PROPOSE. 51 * I hope I have not been de trop, and interrupted a pleasant tete-a-tete ?' * Not at all, Blanche dearest,' replied Henriette, with a somewhat conscious lorok nevertheless. * You have just come in time for dinner.' * And though a gentleman was most atten- tive to me in the train, and insisted on giving me a lunch at York, I have caught such an appetite, by the way !' ^ Glad to hear it,' said the General, who had followed her. ^ In our menu to-day we are to have trout potted in Madeira, and the haunch of a stag shot in the park. We can also let you have a roasted teal,' he added, with a mischievous glance at me. * I am so glad to see you all again ! Give me one more kiss, you dear, dear old thing !' exclaimed the young lady, as she embraced in succession her uncle and aunt, and then, approaching me, held up her soft Greuze- like face and ruby lips in a manner that was very bewildering, even to a man who had been on the point of making a declara- tion to another; for a subtle smile shone around them, and danced within her eyes. E 2 52 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. * Blanche/ said the General, * allow me to introduce Captain Eudkin of the Kifle Brigade — ^my niece, Miss Bingham.' ^ You have just said so in time ; for a moment I thought he was my cousin Jack/ 'Poor Jack is broiling up-country at Allahabad/ . ' I wish the General had delayed his intro- duction for a moment or two,' said I, with a smile and a bow, while it flashed on my mind that the implied compliment was unfair to Henriette. * So delighted to see you. Captain Eudkin ! I have heard so much about you, that you seem quite like an old friend/ ' Indeed ! How, Miss Bingham ?' I in- quired. ' From Henriette's letters.' Poor Henriette coloured painfully, while Miss Bingham divested herself of her hat, veil, and seal- skin jacket, saying laughingly the while : * And you have Colonel Stapleton here and Bob Howard too. So glad you have some gentlemen, auntie ! I was not born to blush WHY I DID NOT PROPOSE. 63 unseen — bloom, I mean — or waste my sweet- ness on my own sex.' I now saw how remarkable was the face of the girl who had dropped so suddenly among us, and at a time so critical for Henriette and me. In expression it could be bright or cloudy, laughing, thoughtful, waggish, or petulant, all manner of things in rapid succession ; yet somehow always flashing and brilliant — a girl to take a man's senses by storm. Though far from being regular, her features, taken altogether, were indeed lovely ; her hair of that brilliant chestnut tint which becomes golden in the sunshine ; her laugh- ing eyes were somewhat of the same hue, a soft hazel, with dark eyebrows and lashes ; and though a little more petite than Hen- riette, her neck, hands, and ears — her whole figure was perfect. The luxuriance of her hair was as wonderful as its fascinating colour, which was indeed that given by painters to their Venuses and other ideal beauties. With a great wealth of animal spirits, the girl, then in all the bloom of eighteen, though her extreme fairness of 54 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. complexion and expression made her seem more girlish, had a charming subtlety of manner, and was well calculated to excite love in men, envy in women, and admiration in both ; for with beauty, dress, and style she had all the desire to please. As she withdrew with her aunt and cousin to dress for dinner, our eyes involuntarily followed her. Those of the white-haired General expressed pleasure and affection, as she was his favourite niece, and little could we then foresee the havoc her perilous beauty was to make among us in the time to come. * She is charming !' I observed. *Yes,' said he enthusiastically, 'and good as she is beautiful, though in truth she is fairer than a fairy /' Was I already forgetting the interruption her sudden arrival had caused ? ( 55 ) CHAPTEE V. 'love not.' The drawing-room at Tliorsgill Hall was filled with the soft but brilliant light of many wax candles. As usual in such apartments, mirrors on all sides reflected and reproduced in endless perspective the draperies, the guests, and also the General's Indian objects* of virtu, which were scattered over all the tables and consoles ; and there, seated on an ottoman, under the chandelier, which poured a flood of light upon her golden hair, her snow-white neck, and tapered arms, our new arrival, bv her excessive animation, made herself the centre of attraction. When seated side by side, the contrast be- tween the cousins was wonderful. Though the daughters of two sisters, the girls were as different in appearance and character as day is from night, as winter from summer ; yet 56 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY, they had one great gift in common : each in her own style could charm her own sex as well as ours. It was an unconscious power of fascination, which may exist irrespective of beauty, of sweetness, even of virtue ; but in this instance, these girls were as pure as they were beautiful and good in the highest degree. The power I mean is most difficult of definition, and is that which a writer has termed * so delicate a mixture of many gifts and qualities that it is difficult to decide on the proportions of each/ Yet times there were when the clear eyes of Blanche seemed to say, * I know that I am beautiful, and what men love and admire.' There was something magnetic in the girl's smile and touch, and she had a marvellous power and trick of the eyes. Eemembering — for she could never forget it — ^the little scene that was about to take so serious a turn in the oriel of the library, Henriette, when her glance caught mine, coloured perceptibly more than once, as if conscious of what might yet take place in time. 'LOVE not: 57 She was perfectly quiet and subdued in bearing, while in that of her cousin, though not less lady-like, there were waggery com- bined with pride, the desire to please and the power to dazzle, with plenty of self- possession and self-will, all of which one would easily pardon in a glowing little beauty, so rich in sunny colouring, with such glorious golden hair, and eyes so sin- gular in hue that they defy analysis or description — for though we thought them light hazel, times there were when they seemed almost golden too; and with such charms and vivacity of manner, her little wild speeches were never misconstrued, and often received with laughter. 'Well, Henriette,' we heard her say, in concluding some topic with her cousin, * it is my character ; and don't be shocked, when I tell you that I would rather be wicked than weak, a knave than a fool, a hammer than an anvil.' * A most decided young woman, certainly,' commented Stapleton in a low voice, while tugging at his moustache as usual. * But I think her just the sort of girl to 58 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. make a fellow cheerful and enchanted with himself, and with herself more especially/ urged the young barrister. * Too much one of the period, for my taste,' replied Stapleton, who for some in- scrutable reason did not seem, just then, to like her. * I believe that, for all the soft- ness of her beauty and flourish of yellow hair, she has no more nerves than a loco- motive.' * And, Blanche, how about your plunger friend ?' asked Henriette with a bright smile. ' Oh, I left Brighton just in time to pre- vent him from making a greater donkey of himself than he has been made by nature,' replied Blanche, while laughing heartily be- hind her fan. * In what way ?' ' He was awfully in love with me, no doubt, and kept us all — the Appleton girls and me — in music, bouquets, tickets for everything, and almost in gloves ; he lost so many bets — the good-natured fellow never seemed to tire of making them and losing them — for all of which I fear I was very ungrateful. 'LOVE not: 59 There was a ball given by the Hussars just before I left, and I can't tell you how many stupid soft things he said between the figures of the quadrilles and in the crush of the supper-room, amid the overpowering and rather mixed odours of jockey-club and fran- gipanni, lobster-salad and hot-house plants, fruit and cold chicken. But his tender utterances were all in vain ; I was bound for distant India — he for the stern military duties of Knightsbridge Barracks ; so there was an end of it, and we were not fated to become a West-end Darby and Joan.' While she was running on in this fashion * — one which led me to infer that it would be difficult to attempt the utterances of * ,stupid soft things' to her — the General, with his feet planted on the hearthrug and his back to the white-marble chimneypiece, though there were flowers only, and not a fire, in the grate, was boring Stapleton with some episode of Chillianwallah; the Howard sisters were performing a sweetly-insipid duet at the piano ; their brother was conversing with our hostess, a handsome old lady with a white- lace cap over her silver hair, and a com- 60 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. plexion nearly as delicate now as in her youth, though wrinkled ; and I lingered in- decisively near the cousins. As the evening drew on, I began to detect a slight constraint in the manner of Henriette towards me, and on Blanche beckoning to me with her fan, and saying, 'Come here, Cap- tain Kudkin — are you afraid of me, that you have barely addressed me to-night ?' the former rose and joined the singers, while I took her place upon the central ottoman. How brilliantly-beautiful the girl looked in the full blaze of the light that shone on her flashing hair and heaving bust ! She wore a dress of lavender-blue silk cut high upon the shoulders, but low in the front, with the finest lace of Malines round her delicate bosom and at the ends of her loose open sleeves. On each white arm was a bracelet of that delicate work and brilliant gold that comes from Delhi; a necklet of the same was round her perfect neck, and she wore a brooch and earrings formed of tiger's claws, all set in the same bright ductile Indian gold — ' Mamma's present on her last birthday,' as she afterwards told me. *'LOVE not: 61 All that a poet, all that a painter ever dreamed of in their happiest moments of inspiration, were in her smile, in her eyes and lips. Would the storms of grief or passion ever furrow that delicate little face ? God alone knew. She looked like a little queen as she lay back in the deep soft ottoman, fanning herself slowly and leisurely, and eyeing me the while, somewhat critically I thought, over the top of her fan ; but she lost no time in plunging into conversation, for topics were easily found. India, which she had left in her childhood ; * Calcutta, whither she was going ; where was my regiment cantoned ? She talked away with singular volubility and grace of the last book which had made a sensation, the belle of the last season, or tenor or picture that had become famous ; where she had been, and people she had met ; the Brighton har- riers, and all manner of things, investing them with an interest, the greatest art of conversation in any woman, and she was but a girl. Her transitions were always abrupt, however ; thus, when we were talking of the 62 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY, then recent ^Ya^ in the Crimea, she suddenly said, ' My cousin Henriette is very pretty. Don't you think so ?' ' Pretty — she is simply lovely/ ' You admire her, then ?' 'Of course; but who could fail to do so?' Yet at that moment — traitor that I was ! — I was already almost surmising in my heart, ' How can a man love any woman but a fair one ?' And then, as I gazed into the face of Blanche Bingham, I recalled the words of a writer who says, that the charming activity of soul and spiritual energy ' which give animation, grace, and living light to the animal form, is after all the real source of woman's beauty.' The eyes of Henriette were handsome, dark, and thoughtful, but they did not possess the sunny light that shone in those of Blanche. ' And you leave for India — when ?' she asked me, after a little pause. ' In the second month of the year, pro- bablv. I have to take a detachment of troops.' *LOVE not: 63 * How delightful, if we were all going together !' * Delightful, indeed !' * But we go out overland. I do doat upon soldiers, though I don't think mamma would permit me to marry one/ * Why ?' I asked, surprised by the sudden turn our short conversation had taken ; one rather perilous too with such a companion. * Because she approves highly of the Civil Service, and all people who know India say that there the red coats have no chance whatever compared with the black.' * Fortunately my uniform is a green one.' ^ Yes, of course, you are in the Kifies.' *And green is the colour of constancy,' said I insinuatingly. * And also of extreme verdure,' she added, with half-closed eyes. Then, after a pause : * If I ever marry,' she said, with her head a little on one side, and her eyelids cast down demurely, * which, perhaps, I never shall—' 'A strange doubt for a young lady — you especially.' 64 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. * Why me especially ?' * Can you ask me, with all those mirrors around us ?' * I mean, that if I do. there is one kind of marriage I shall never make.' ' May I inquire what it is ?' I asked, be- coming amused by the strange humour of the girl. ' That which is habitually termed by parents and guardians a *^ prudent" marriage, which leads to a life of dull and respectable routine, with some elderly commissioner, or used-up planter, or a Calcutta merchant, with as many ailments as he has rupees ; such a husband as match-making mammas prefer to a poor but handsome young man, with all the cardinal virtues and a great many more. I don't think I could pass through life without an episode or two, and dwindle down into a respectable old lady ; one, perhaps, irreproachable as Mrs. Hannah More. Heavens ! what would such a starched dame think if she saw me after the Brighton harriers, rushing my horse at a five-barred gate, or a breast-high hedge, as Jacky Appleton and I did the other day ! I *LOVE not: 65 must love the man I shall marry, and shall choose for myself too.' ' Happy, indeed, must the man he you approve of,' said I in a lower tone than we had yet used. * Now, Captain Rudkin,' said she, turning her eyes full upon me, ^ we have had hunt- ing, literature, art, music, and many other things under discussion, so do not let us degenerate into flirtation.' * In the present instance I should dread doing so ; but why ?' * It sometimes paves the way for real love-making, and that is — is — ' * What ?' * Very pleasant with some people, very tire- some with others, and occasionally treasonable. ' Full of fun and mischief, her eyes of golden hazel were cast on Henriette as she said this; and I felt my colour rise, for during the past hour, in which I had been absorbed in Blanche, I had not been quite unconscious that the dark eyebrows of her cousin — brows that almost met over her straight and delicately-cut nose — had worn a cloudy expression more than once. VOL. I. p GQ FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. Impelled by the tenderness I felt, by courtesy, and a fear that I had offended her by a neglect that was all unusual, I approached her ; but though her lips smiled gaily, the grave and somewhat hard expres- sion of her eyes was distinctly perceptible to me, who had watched their changes so often and so earnestly; yet Henriette had great command over herself, and I had still every anxiety to resume the thread of that little conversation which Blanche's sudden arrival had so awkwardly interrupted. * This room is insufferably close,' she said, in reply to some general remark of mine. ' The conservatory is lighted,' I hinted, and drew back the curtain that fell before the entrance thereto. ^ May I offer you my arm ?' 'No — thanks — pray don't trouble,' she re- plied hurriedly, and passed in, followed by young Howard. I felt that I had piqued her unintentionally; she was a little jealous ; and with this con- viction a thrill of pleasure passed through my breast ; yet it seemed to me, that in the art of flirting, in the use of the eyes and 'LOVE not: 67 little occasional touches with the hand, I had made more progress with Blanche in one hour than I had done with Henriette Guise in two months. The instinct of love is acute (if she did indeed love me), and per- ceptive of the slightest coldness in manner, in tone, in a glance, or the merest inflection of the voice ; for there is a sympathy that lovers alone can feel and know, and of which the unobservant or the uninitiated can know nothing. A little space served to make matters more cloudy still ; for when Henriette re-entered the room, Blanche had spread her ample blue-silk dress over the piano-stool, and with her white fingers rambling over the keys, her handsome head, her golden hair shining like an aureole round it, thrown well back, her seductive eyes upturned and bent on me, with no small empressement, while I ofliciated in the capacity of leaf- turner, she sang a then some- what hackneyed fashionable song : * Love not ! love not ! tfe^ thing you love may change : The rosy lip may cease to smile on you : The kindly beaming eye grow cold and strange ; The heart still warmly beat, but not be true.' P 2 08 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. The quiet dark eyes of lier cousin regarded us, I thought, with something of disdain. Was this chosen song to be prophetic, or did Blanche sing it, so pointedly and winningly, merely in her usual spirit of waggish raillery ? When it was ended, a movement on the part of our hostess indicated that the ladies were about to leave us. ' And now, good night, dearest uncle,' said Blanche, turning up her bright face for his kiss, and taking his old face between two hands that were as white as the leaves of the camellia. ' Of course you are all bound for the smoking-room, where, amid the fumes of the "fragrant weed" — isn't that the phrase. Captain Eudkin ? — you will be discussing everything, from breech-loaders to ballet-girls, and from the winner of the Derby to the newest thing in neck-ties.' As her aunt said again, her ^ tongue did indeed run on.' After that we heard her voice, laughing, and humming 'Love not,' as she passed up- stairs to the corridors where the bedrooms were. It seemed to me, amid after-thoughts in 'LOVE NOT.' 69 the smoking-room, that Blanche's soft hand had hngered a moment in mine, as the girl made some playful remark ; and that when I turned to look for Henriette, she was gojie. 70 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. CHAPTEE VL IN THE PICTUKE GALLERY. Next day I was up and abroad before any of our party, and sauntered on the terrace before the house, enjoying a cigar and the sunshine of a glorious and breezy September morning, and marveUing whether I should be fortunate enough to meet Henriette Guise alone once more. The dewy masses of dark green ivy that covered the walls of the Hall were literally alive with twittering sparrows ; the lark was soaring high in the blue welkin ; the ruddy morning sun threw the shadows of the trees far across the grassy sward, and brought out in strong light the quaint facade of the mansion, with all its abutments, towers, pin- nacles, and oriels, the walls of old red brick, while the cornices, muUions, and transoms were of white stone, carved and polished. IN THE PICTURE GALLERY. 71 Which of all those shining windows, I surmised, may light the room of Henriette, when perhaps at this moment her white cheek is resting on the pillow. In the background, high over the Hall, on the slope of a hill, but close by, were the ruins of an older edifice, its predecessor ; a castle of more stirring times than ours, built by the Geoffrey Dormer of King Stephen's days, as Henriette informed me, in the vaulted hall of which, for many hundred winters, the red yule log had blazed in the bottle -chimney, throwing a warm glow on many successive generations of happy English* faces ; on the green holly-bush and its scarlet berries ; on the smoking haunch and the wassail bowl ; but now, where whilom shouts and laughter rang, there is nothing heard * but the whistle of the bat and the rustle of the long reedy grass as it waves on the cold hearthstone. And more than once, when rambling there with Henriette, she had shown me a great beam over the great entrance, and above the shield charged with ten billets and the demi lion of the Dormers; a great oak 72 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. beam, where once swung the panier de mort — an iron basket for hurhng a torrent of stones on the heads of invading Scots or other enemies — till the destruction of the pile by David II., before the battle of Neville's Cross. At one of the sunlit oriels, the central window of which opened down to a flight of steps that led to the terrace, I saw the flutter of a lady's dress, and hastening for- ward met — not Henriette, but Blanche Bing- ham ; and I began to think there was some fatality in this. ' Good morning. Captain Eudkin," said she, playfully waving her hand, after kiss- ing it, toward me. ' I too am early abroad ; but I cannot forget my schoolgirl hours and habits.' How bright, pure, and marvellously fair the girl looked, fresh from her bed and bath, as she stood in the glare of the sunlight, clad in a white morning dress trimmed with blue ribbons ! She did indeed seem be- witching and kissable, with her scarlet mobile lips, dimpled cheeks, and laughing eyes, which, like all her features and her busy IN THE PICTURE GALLERY. 73 litttle tongue, were iii full play ; for she was always on excellent terms with herself, and possessed so much individuality of character that those who once knew her could never forget her. Though so young, and, to all appearance, artless, with her golden hair, her blush- rose cheeks, and pretty waggish ways, Blanche Bingham was nevertheless mistress of all the various modes by which the most experienced woman of the world can let a man see that he is agreeable to her; and somehow she was permitted to make audacious little speeches, such as her cousin Henriette and other girls would not have ventured to utter, her soft beauty and mercurial spirits finding ready pardon for that which the ill-natured might have termed flippancy. *This is the window of the picture gallery,' said she, ' let us promenade till breakfast- time.' 'If you can find amusement in my society.' * Oh, I am sure I shall. I begin to like you very much, Captain Kudkin.' *How can you flatter me so?' I asked, 74 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. both puzzled to find the order of conversation becoming inverted. ' But really, I find no one here worth talking to but you. Aunt Dormer is always full of advice or stories of her old ayahs, the Dorcas meetings, the vicar's last sermon; and such things don't interest me. Dear uncle Dormer always talks, if not of the county pack, bullocks and mangel-wurzel, grouse and hunting, of Anglo-Indian shop and Chillianwallah.' ' There is Mr. Howard — ' ^ He is somewhat muffy (I am not at school now), and always takes antibilious pills, and wears goloshes in wet weather.' ' Stapleton, then ?' I suggested, laughing outright. She coloured at the mention of Ms name, why I knew not then, and replied : ' The gallant Colonel is too much occupied by the contemplation of himself to think of me, and I care not for him.' (These words were to come back to me at a future time and in another land.) ' I love my cousin Henriette, but she has grown quite triste; as we dressed our hair IN THE PICTURE GALLERY. 75 together this morning, I could not extract a word from her, even about you ; but when you know me better, Captain Kudicin, you will find that I am very difficult to please/ ' Then how flattered I should be by your frankly admitting that you began to ** like " mel' ' Not at all ; perhaps I shall tire of you too/ ' I thought that you longed to come to Thorsgill Hall ?' ' I was very happy at Brighton ; but rela- tions must be humoured, and I am longing now to be with mamma in India.' • Quite natural ; but are you weary of England ?' *I cannot say. Aunt tells me that the balls there are delightful; only forty ladies perhaps present, the half of them married, and as many as four hundred gentlemen all contending for their hands as partners/ ' The Overland Eoute will soon change all that/ * What a premium Henriette and I shall be at in the Land of the Sun !' she ex- claimed, with a little ringing laugh ; and I 76 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. now began to perceive that if a phrenologist had passed his hand among her wealth of shining hair, he would find her organ of love of admiration pretty strongly developed. At that moment a door was opened by a footman, and Henriette, with Stapleton, joined us. Handsome indeed she looked, in a pink morning dress trimmed with white lace — a wife for any man to be proud of, and over whose household she would in- fallibly shed grace and brilliance. Her greeting to me was, I felt, somewhat coldly polite. Could she have thought that Blanche and I were there by appointment already ? In one point only had the cousins a little resemblance. Blanche, though her hair was golden, had eyebrows that were nearly as dark as those of Henriette, but more deli- cately pencilled ; and though both girls had been under the care of a West- end ^ professor of deportment,' they possessed in all their actions a natural grace that she could never have imparted to them. * I trust we — aw — don't intrude ?' said IN THE PICTURE GALLERY. . 77 Stapleton, in his usual blandly insincere and rather offensive tone. * What leads you to think so ?' asked Blanche curtly, but with a smile. * Because,' replied the Colonel, laughing, and applying his strong white hand to his tawny moustache, and, by a blundering attempt at a joke, giving his question more point, 'the picture gallery and the library are so often the places for scenes and denou- ments in novels and dramas. In the first place, we have our own ancestors, or some " other fellow's " ancestors, looking down upon us sternly or serenely, as the case may be — ' * By the way,' interrupted Blanche, with one of her merriest smiles, ' surely I inter- rupted some very special conversation in the library on the evening of my arrival ?' ' You interrupted a very pleasant tete-a-tete — that was all,' said I, on perceiving a dis- tinct shade of annoyance cross the face of her cousin — a shade perceptible to myself alone. ' And our subject was perhaps less curious than the discussion we overheard between 78 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY, you and Captain Kudkin last night,' said Henriette, with one of her quiet smiles. 'About marriage — yes, it was quite a serious affair.' *I thought your ideas, or your speeches at least, a little wild, Blanche,' said her aunt, who had just joined us. * Concerning the man I would not marry ? 0, dear aunt, how I should like to see in a dream, or a mirror, the happy man whom I am in future to honour, and of course dis- obey — as I shall be sure to do — while turning the domestic treadmill, when all the excite- ment of the shower of old shoes and the wedding-tour is over. Now, if I always acted properly as a young lady — ' * Do you not do so, Blanche ? asked Mrs. Dormer. * Ah, don't chide me, dear auntie. I mean that if I did so, I should not converse about marriage to gentlemen; but I fear I shall never be wise or saintly.' We now turned to inspect some of the pictures. ' That is Chillianwallah, of course,' said Stapleton, with a glance at me, 'and these IN THE PICTURE GALLERY, 79 are the 14th Light Dragoons advancing to the charge, supported by Dormer's Brigade/ ' And this is a fox-hunt in Langiey Dale, with the General in at the death,' said Blanche, pointing to a large oil-painting exhibiting a vast sweep of purple moorland, in the centre of which was a confused mob of struggling hounds killing their fox, groups of red- coated horsemen in the distance, and one close at hand presented a good likeness of our host on his favourite hunter. She now proceeded to quiz the family portraits, and tell droll anecdotes about each. There were Dormers in wigs and breast- plates, who had fought at Edgehill and New- bury ; dames in long stomachers and high toupees, with fans, apples, or pomander balls in their long lean fingers ; powdered belles who had made havoc among the beaux of former days ; and some there were who were dressed as shepherds and shepherdesses a la Watteau ; and on each and all she had some witty remark to make, considering that, as they were her own ancestors, she was free to do so. ' Here is my great-grandfather, Sir Philip 80 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. Dormer, who fought at Dettingen, Minden, or somewhere, tending his sheep with crook, in a brocaded suit and brigadier wig, with Thorsgill Hall in the middle distance, a stream in the foreground : ** By the side of a murmuring brook An elderly gentleman sat ; On the top of his head was his wig, On the top of his wig was his hat." ' * Of whom is this the portrait ?' I asked. * Surely this proud and sad, yet lovely, woman must have had a story ?' ' Happy women rarely have,' replied Henriette. ' Our grandfather brought it from Sicily, where he had been serving with the army under Sir John Stuart, the Count of Maida/ It was a full length, as dark as a Hans Holbein, yet as softly painted as a Titian, representing a lady in a long brocaded dress, covered with seed pearls, cut low and square to show a magnificent bosom. Her face very beautiful, but very pale ; and the dark brown eyes had a gaze in them that followed from whatever point you viewed them. Her hair, a reddish auburn, fell in a mass behind IN THE PICTURE GALLERY, 81 her head, which was haughtily turned to the left, while her gathered skirt was held by her right hand, on the wrist of which sat a hooded falcon. *You surmise correctly. Captain Eudkin,' said Henriette, coming close to me ; * she had a story — a strange but not a sad one/ * Who was she ?' I asked, glad of an excuse for conversing with Henriette, and gazing into her deep dark eyes. * Camilla de Turin ge, a rich and handsome lady of Messina ; we have all her history in a little manuscript book in the library/ ^Please, cousin, don't produce the manu- script, or I should think I am at school again,' said Blanche, 'but tell us all about it/ * The book has it,' began Henriette, her dark eyes filling with animation as she spoke, * that Eoland, brother of Pedro, King of Sicily, to whom he had given command of a squadron of galleys to oppose the fleet of Eobert, King of Naples, was defeated at sea, and taken into captivity; from which his brother, in a spirit of resentment, failed VOL. I. G 82 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. to redeem him or pay his ransom, which amounted to twelve thousand florins ; so he bade fair to remain a prisoner for hfe ; and, in bitterness, he spoke of this to Camilla de Turinge. ' '' Take courage, Don Eoland," said she; '' when youth, health, and hope are com- bined, what is there in this world that we may not attain ?" ' '' True, with love and happiness perhaps ; but I am a hopeless prisoner." ' ** You shall be free on one condition." ' '' Oh, name it !" he exclaimed. ' Then the beautiful Messinian, after much circumlocution, gave Eoland to understand that he should have his ransom money, on condition he espoused her — ' ' Shocking — to purchase a husband ?' ex- claimed Blanche. * I should like to be loved for myself, and myself alone, even as King Cophetua loved the beggar maid. Had she fallen in love with him, Henriette T ' Yes ; for this Eoland was one of the handsomest men in the Two Sicilies; and seeing no other means of escaping from a life of bondage, he promised her marriage as IN THE PICTURE GALLERY. 83 soon as he could visit Messina. On pay- ment of her twelve thousand florins, Eoland obtained his freedom, his sword, and armour, and at once put to sea, resolving to return no more, as he had no intention of ful- filling his promise ; and in justification alleged the great disparity of their ranks in life, though Camilla — who was determined to have justice done her — produced their mutual bond, the terms of which Don Pedro ordered his brother to fulfil to the letter/ *I have no patience with this woman!' exclaimed Blanche ; * how could she be so odiously spiritless ? * Wait a little, cousin. Accompanied by many great lords and ladies, clad in gorgeous apparel, Eoland set out for the stately villa of his intended, who received them dressed in her richest attire ; and then, kneeling, he entreated that she would forgive his past duplicity, and let their engagement be ful- filled. * ** Stay, sir,'' said she ; '* I wished, in my ambition, to have a husband of royal blood, though, sooth to say, I did love and pity G 2 84 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. you; but you have degraded yourself from your rank by breaking a plighted troth, and from that moment I have sworn never to be yours. Keep your ransom-money, and reserve that dishonoured hand for another. You are free to go — adieu !" * And snatching up her skirt (just as we see it in the picture), as if the touch of Koland were pollution, she swept from the room, leaving him overwhelmed with con- fusion and rage. After this she retired into a convent at Palermo, wherein grandpapa's regiment was quartered after the battle of Maida, and there he obtained this por- trait.' * Captain Kudkin, you have been looking at me for the last ten minutes in most atten- tive silence,' said Blanche, when her cousin ended ; * now, pray, what do you think of me?' * Think !' I repeated, in some perplexity. * That I am a very eccentric and unusual young lady ; is such the case ?' * Unusual, certainly,' said I, gazing into the laughing eyes. ^ Then you must tell me how and where- IN THE PICTURE GALLERY. 85 fore at breakfast, for there sounds the gong, and I shall take your arm/ And thus I was, in a manner, made prisoner. A single week after this saw a strange change in me, for my mind began to waver between the fair and the dark cousin. How- ever anxious I may have been to seek a secret interview with Henriette, and to re- turn to the subject of my suit, though perhaps she did not avoid me, she never, from the epoch of Blanche's arrival, per- mitted herself to be left alone with me. At times I conceived the idea of writing to her on the subject of the hopes that had been growing so dear to me ; but then the mere circumstance of finding her apparently too much occupied with Stapleton would pique me, and I relinquished the idea. We had often been much alone before, but never were so now. Why was this ? Was it that she knew I had admired and learned to love her ; but that she could not or would not accept me, and yet expected a regular proposal for the mere luxury of declining it ? 86 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. I was most unjust to Henriette ; but a long time was to elapse, and terrible events were to happen, ere I learned the light in which she viewed me then. ( 87 ) CHAPTER VII. DRIFTING. In our limited circle at Thorsgill Hall it was impossible, from the mere circumstance of. propinquity, to remain insensible to the attractions of such a girl as Blanche Bing- ham, who, as she had a decided penchant for the army, being one who made no secret* of her ' doating on the military,' and who seemed to dress for me, sing for me, talk for me, as if systematically to pique Jocelyn Stapleton, who had been her admirer during her short season in London. This on the one hand. On the other, the reputed wealth and ambitious views of Henriette's parents, and hence the convic- tions that my prospects were hopeless with her, made me perhaps seek in Blanche a counterfoil, and a perilous one she proved; one whose eyes were for ever to haunt me 88 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. in the time to come. A scrap of conversa- tion which one day I was in a manner com- pelled to overhear, decided me in my plans for the future. On the terrace beneath my window the cousins were conversing merrily, while gathering in a china vase the fading leaves of the monthly roses, that were trained over a wooden frame between the projecting oriels ; and as they did so, my own name fell more than once on my ear. I was writing at an open window, and the abstract question of my right to listen was rendered faint by the intensity of my curiosity to hear what they said or thought of me. ^ And so his name is Lancelot ?' said Blanche. ' Yes.' * I saw it in the Army List ; and I saw, too, that he had purchased his lieutenancy.' (It seemed odd for a young lady to remark this, and take an interest in my funds.) ' And it is he you wrote of so often as your admirer, Henriette ?' * I never said so much, Blanche.' DRIFTING. 89 * I inferred it from many things you wrote.' ' I have qnite forgotten what I wrote.' ' And he has been here two months ?' ^ Two whole months and more.' ' And has never proposed !' * Never, Blanche ; and no proposal was certainly expected by me.' '"Why, Henriette dear, you are blushing scarlet ; but then you are very fond of him — I can see that.' * You must neither say nor think so.' * Of course ; but it does not matter what I say to you. Now tell me, would you accept* him if he did propose ?' (How intently I listened for the reply !) * Most certainly not — ' These three important words alone fell on my ear, for the conclusion of the sentence was lost as they turned the corner of the terrace. I drew a long breath — half a sigh, perhaps — and proceeded leisurely, yet not without an emotion of great pique, to manipulate and light a cigar. 'How fortunate,' thought I, 'that when her ideas are so decided, I did not commit 90 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. myself, as on so many occasions I had so fully resolved to do ! Yet the girl is beau- tiful, and I was pretty far gone with her before the other attraction came. However, I think I shall start to-morrow for town or for Tilbury Fort.' But I did neither ; and feeling sure that I had judged the character of Miss Guise rightly, I abandoned myself to the attraction of the golden-haired counterfoil, and soon learned to be tolerablv indifferent even to t/ any attentions Stapleton might pay her. I felt horribly piqued, nevertheless, and at first somewhat sore at heart. The women who have usually most power over that organ in the male world are not generally beauties, but they must possess some mysterious trick of manner or some secret magnetic influence ; and, in the in- stance of Blanche Bingham, both were in- herent, together with natural charms of the highest order ; and with a girl so frank and free, our acquaintance ripened, as she once phrased it, * with wonderful rapidity.' She and I were often on such perilous ground as I had never been with Henriette — DRIFTING. 91 half love-making, half banter ; for her whole style of conversation was eminently calcu- lated to lure a man into close flirtation, and thence to downright love-making. ' Oh, it must be a terrible mistake to fall in love with the wrong person, as that Lady Camilla did. I wonder if I shall ever do so,' said she one evening, when were seated in the same oriel of the drawing-room, where I had sat with Henriette on the occasion when the Gazette came, and my mind was then filled by her image only. ' Aunt Dor- mer says young ladies should not talk of love to gentlemen,' she continued, as fronl some passage in a novel we had fallen upon the subject ; ' and so we must talk of some- thing else.' ' True ; for indeed it is perilous work.' ' How r ' With you,' said I, lowering my voice, as I gazed on the masses of her shining hair. * Perhaps it is,' said she, looking up at me with one of her coy and wonderful smiles. ' Do you know what the German Wieland, 92 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. who was a great disciple of Cupid, said of Love ?' ^No.' ' That its metaphysical effects began with the first sigh, and ended with the first kiss.'^ ' Oh, that could never be ; and I don't think your friend Wieland knew anything about it. I don't think, moreover, that the great mass of you men know much con- cerning the refinements of love, that which is sentimental being so much an effort of the mere imagination.' It was rather bewildering work to hear the pretty casuist running on in this way, and eyeing me the while in a manner she had over the top of her fan. After a minute's silence, she again looked up and said : ' You seem to make me a study ; you think me a horrible puzzle— an enigma, in fact.' * Pardon me, but I know your character perfectly. ' ' Indeed!' said she, laughing, and showing a row of closely-set little teeth, that glittered like pearls in the sunshine ; * then you know DRIFTING. 93 more of me than T do of myself, and are cleverer than I thought.' ^ Thank you ; but, nevertheless, I do.' * From what do you gather it ? You have known me only for a fortnight.' ' I gathered much of your characteristics from the last letter you wrote Mrs. Dormer from Brighton.' 'Did auntie read my rantipole letter to youV she asked, with dilated eyes. ' Yes, and to us all, at breakfast.' ^And the passage about Colonel Staple- ton ?' she exclaimed, colouring as she did so. ' Yes.' * How could she !' I perceived a shade of keen annoyance cross her little face, while she looked down and toyed with an opal ring, which looked suspiciously like one I had seen on the Colonel's hand ; and this action I recalled at a future time, when all our circumstances had changed and become truly terrible. * And from that letter you judge of me ?' ^ Well, it seemed a fair epitome of — ' ' The conceits of a vain silly girl, who 94 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. loves fun and folly, and has no desire to be thought a wallflower at any time, and who defies the envious eyes of all passe female detectives and envious rivals.' ' What a singular account of yourself, Miss Bingham ! Kivals you can have none ; and must have ever many, many friends.' ' People may have many acquaintances in this world, but few friends.' 'Are you going to be misanthropical now?' I asked, laughing at her strange humour. 'When you really do know me. Captain Eudkin, you will find that I can be all manner of things in an hour.' And she smiled and laughed as she spoke, this strange fairy-like creature, who was be- ginning to see how her hoydenish gaiety of manner, her indescribable eyes, and the sunny masses of her silken hair had be- wildered and charmed me. The General, Howard, and Stapleton were now left to beat the moors or follow the harriers without me. I had invention enough to find excuses for remaining at the Hall, resolved to make the most of what remained of my leave of absence, only some DRIFTING. 95 seven short weeks now, and devoted myself to Blanche and Blanche only. In a party even so small as ours there was not privacy for any one, and few opportunities for love- making unless two strolled away together, and thus attracted attention. Yet we occa- sionally braved this ; and times there were when I walked with her in the chase or the garden, the lawn or the avenue, when her hand being on my arm, I held it in mine as it lay there, and she neither withdrew it nor made remark thereon. On this I had never ventured with Henriette ; and aware ^ of this, the impulse to take it became habitual, and I was fast drifted into de- liberate love-making, which somehow she seemed to expect ; for the girl was naturally prone to flirtation, and how few men could have looked into those eyes of hers, and not felt, by their smile and their general ex- pression, that the owner thereof thought him worth winning ! As yet I went no farther, not even when we rambled on the terrace, ostensibly to look at the moon. For, despite the encouragement she gave 96 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. me, I had a wholesome dread of her spirit of raillery, and surmised that perhaps I might only be making ^ a donkey ' of myself, as she wrote her Guardsman was so nearly doing at Brighton. Thus, while her rare beauty attracted me on one hand, I feared that she might never be serious, and that if I addressed her gravely or passionately, I might only excite her too ready ridicule ; and I knew that a lover once laughed at may deem his cause for ever lost. Was it possible that the girl had conceived a fancy for me, that she was so pitiless in the rivalry of her almost equally beautiful, but less impulsive, cousin ? And if so, why did she perplex me by wearing that opal ring which I suspected to have been once Colonel Stapleton's ? So completely did Blanche attract me, and so completely had I abandoned myself to the charm of her society, that without any emotion of regret I found myself visiting with her many a spot, to the beauties of which I had been first introduced by Henriette, who soon found herself de trap where she had once been principal; but DRIFTING. 97 the memory of her reply rankled in my heart, and more than once the dinner gong was thundered for us in vain, to the indigna- tion of the General, whose punctuality was most military in its tenor. And so, on and on, I found myself as if attracted by a magnetic power beyond my own control, swiftly drifting into love with this fair hoyden, for such, in sooth, she was. VOL. I. H 98 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. CHAPTEE VIII. ' OVEK BANK, BUSH, AND SCAUR.' A CRISIS in our affairs was bronght about by a chain of little circumstances and an adventure, the end of which we could not have foreseen. One evening when the General, Stapleton, and the barrister, with old Bagshaw and the other keepers, had gone after the birds to the heathy wastes of Hindon Edge, the ladies proposed an expedition to visit the woods and ruins of Egliston Abbey. Blanche Bingham and I proposed to ride, while the other four of our party were to occupy the carriage, which was soon brought round to the door, together with our horses. What a picture Blanche was, in her blue riding-habit, with her fair hair done up tightly in a coil, thus thrusting her smart 'OVER BANK, BUSH, AND SCAUR: 99 hat rather forward, but jauntily, over her forehead ; her Httle hands encased in tight and well- fitting gauntlet gloves ; a gold- mounted switch grasped in one, her ample skirt upheld by the other ! * You evidently consider me an object of interest,' said she smilingly — but she was always smiling — as she came tripping down the perron, after I had handed her aunt, cousin, and the other two ladies into the carriage ; * now, what is the result of your inspection ?' * Admiration, to be frank,' said I. * Every man in your regiment might have his mind occupied in the same lucrative way, for all that I value admiration,' she con- tinued, with a proud little pout, * that of one man being quite as valuable as that of another.' * Ah, do not say so !' ' What would you have me do ? I am used to it,' said the saucy little beauty; ' and now. Captain Rudkin, help me to mount, and then please to give one glance at my bridle, as I never believe in grooms.' The pleasing task of swinging her light H 2 100 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. lithe figure into the saddle of her chestnut was soon accomplished — too soon, indeed, as it was one over which I was quite prepared to linger. She gathered up her reins, and her horse, which seemed disposed to swerve round and prove restive, she speedily reduced to obedience by the firmness of her hand on the bridle, and by one smart little touch with her switch. How erectly and splendidly she sat her horse ! but then it was impossible for this girl to do any action ungracefully. * I am glad you ain't timorous, Miss Bingham,' said a groom, touching his hat. ' I seldom am ; but why now ?' * Because the chestnut don't look par- ticularly steady to-day. Shorten your reins, miss, and keep him well in hand.' The carriage had already started and was bowling down the avenue, and we followed, but so leisurely that it was soon a quarter of a mile before us. Blanche was prattling gaily as usual, but found that her horse ere long caused her serious interruptions, and began to prove uncommonly restive, thus infecting with the same unruly spirit 'OVER BANE, BUSH, AND SCAUR: 101 ' one of the General's tall roan hunters on which I was mounted. Frequently I leaned forward, patted the neck of the chestnut, whose skin was Hke satin, talked to him, and tried to coax him into a better mood ; but all seemed unayail- ing. His quivering ears were often thrown back, his head was bent low, almost pulling the reins out of her delicate hands, and she told me that the strain was making her dear tender arms ache, and his mouth * seemed as hard as wood.' Anon the chestnut began to stamp violently, with low ansiT snorts, and turn his eves back • from time to time. *I fear he seems bent on mischief,' said I anxiouslv. * Don't be alarmed for me,' replied my companion; *if he is bent on making a scene, foi-tunately I am a very good horse- woman. I wish you had seen Jacky Apple- ton and me after the Bris^hton harriers.' ' The brute seems fresh.' ' He has been nearlv three weeks in the stable, the groom told me.' The evening was one of sunshiae, but 102 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. the clouds were gathered in great dun masses, that darkened in some places to purple, making the woods and moorlands seem almost black; and between these masses the rays fell in radiating flakes of golden light on farm and hamlet, copse and field, on church tower and cottage roof. The carriage was stopped from time to time at certain points, to enable the Miss Howards to examine certain features of the landscape ; and we took especial care to rein up at the same time and look about us too, so that we might preserve our relative distance ; for, sooth to say, though Henriette Guise more than once looked back after us, we were much more occupied with each other than with agricultural matters, archaeology, or the objects of nature. But sometimes now we rode in silence, a silence, however, that was not without its eloquence, for glances could be exchanged that were full of deep and tender meaning. Thus after a time we discovered that we had lost sight of the carriage altogether, and found that we had taken a different way. "When last we saw it, the party *OVER BANK, BUSH, AND SCAUR: lOH had halted where the road went over an eminence, at a point whence the stately ruin and round towers of Barnard Castle, and the long wooded vista of the valley of the Tees, could be seen; but we remembered thatjthe roof had been closed by the foot- man. Keflecting on this made us look about, and we found that, unnoticed by us during our mutual absorption, the sunlight had faded away; that the whole sky was now veiled in masses of heavy cloud ; a low wind was soughing, as the Scots say, among the way- side trees ; the dark river seemed to brawl ^ more hoarsely over its bed of rock ; the birds were flying low in a scared manner ; the grey smoke from cottages hidden amongst the luxuriant coppices, which previously had ascended high in air, was now blown away at a right angle from the chimney. There was every sign of a wild night, and as a hint thereof some raindrops, that felt warm rather than cold, were beginning to plash on the dusty roadway, causing us mutually to reflect that we were several miles from home. 104 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. ' This is not the way to EgHston Woods or the Abbey Bridge/ said Blanche. ' And I fear that we shall see neither to- night, ' I replied, looking at my watch ; * the time is a quarter past six ; and the sun has set/ Before Blanche could make a response, I had the sensation of being surrounded by fire, wrapped in it, as it were, the glare being blinding ; and then a peal, like the salvo of fifty great guns discharged at once, reverberated over our heads. ^ A thunderstorm ! Take care, Miss Bing- ham ; for God's sake, Blanche, be wary !' I had no time to utter more. Almost ere the first thunder-peal had died away there followed a second and a third, and when the latter burst, her startled chest- nut reared wildly up, and then sprang for- ward with a bound. On each occasion the light girl nearly lost her seat, but stuck to her saddle bravely. For a moment the chestnut stood still, but trembling violently in every nerve and fibre. I urged my horse forward to take it by the bridle ; but ere I could do so, the chestnut bolted away at full 'OVER BANK, BUSH, AND SCAUR: 105 and furious speed, with neck outstretched, his ears laid close back on his sleek small head, and the bit wedged as if in a vice between his firm-set teeth. With a trembling heart I followed at full speed, but failed to get near the wild brute that seemed so suddenly to become possessed by a devil, and to be bearing his rider away to destruction, amid the darkness that was fast coming on. The blinding rain, which the thunder-peals seemed to have let loose from the sky, was borne full in our faces by the gusty wind; but with all my strength and skill, and all the speed my hunter could' exert, I followed her chestnut, which, after striking off the main road, took a way across a line of country which I knew to be full of quarries, lime-kilns, deep-cuttings and hollows, watercourses, loose stone fences, and other dangers which I shuddered to think of. My own horse seemed now to become in- fected by a mad racing spirit ; each made the other worse in this fierce career, which I could not abandon, even had I been dis- posed to do so, and away they tore together. 106 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. No cry of terror escaped the brave girl, who bent all her energies to keep her seat and to guide a horse that was beyond her guidance now ; and like one in a dream — a nightmare — I followed her, with no sound in my ears but the rush of the hoofs, the hiss of the falling rain, an occasional shout of fear, pity, or dismay from a wayfarer; and with her skirt flapping wildly before me, all sodden though it was, she was borne away, away, ^ over bank, bush, and scaur,' into the wrack and obscurity of the stormy night, I knew not whither. ( 107 ) CHAPTEK IX. A NIGHT OF ALAKM. Driven homeward in hot haste, the carriage with its four occupants returned to Thors- gill Hall. Mrs. Dormer asked of the lodge- keeper if we had arrived; but he assured her that no one had passed down the avenue since our departure. * Then came the dog-cart from the moors, with the General and his two guests drenched, and all impatient for dry clothing and brandy. On being told that we were out in this sudden storm, he made light of it, never doubting but that we had taken shelter somewhere, and would most probably send a messenger for the carriage. The dinner passed over in all its cumbrous Anglo-Indian state without the absentees ; episodes of the day's sport were discussed with vivacity; but when nine o'clock was 108 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. struck by all the clocks in the house, glances of surprise, and then of uneasiness, were exchanged. Stapleton looked intensely annoyed, though what particular interest he could have in the affair it was difficult to divine. The General went again and again to the windows, and looked out into the blackness of the night — that wild, weird, and dreary September night — when the rain was pouring down in torrents, literally washing the walls of the Hail, and when the wind was bellowing among the old trees of the chase. 4,. ' Blanche's horse looked very restive this evening,* said Henriette ; ' I trust those dreadful thunder - peals may not have frightened it.' ' Heavens above!' said her uncle anxiously, ' don't hint of such a thing. Ten o'clock now,' he added, looking at his watch ; * what can have happened ? This absence is cer- tainly out of the ordinary course of things. They have been away nearly seven hours already.' Stapleton thought it was very like an elopement, though of course he did not A NIGHT OF ALARM. 109 venture to say so ; and this idea grew stronger in his mind when midnight came, and the natural alarm of the household in- creased. He had no suggestions to offer, so he tugged his moustache viciously and main- tained an ominous silence. * We have heard nothing of Chillian wallah to-night, however,' thought he. ' The storm without is still dreadful !' said Henriette, as she withdrew the curtain of a window for a moment ; * listen to the rain, how it comes pouring down ! Is it not strange this terror should have come upon us to-night, uncle ?' ' Why, what night is it ?' he asked curtly. * The anniversary of that on which the noisy company have been usually heard in the north wing, and then there is always a storm, the housekeeper told me.' ' North-country superstition and folly ! How can you talk of such things gravely ? They must have ridden for shelter some- where !' suggested the General emphatically, for the fiftieth time. * But why not have ridden home V asked Colonel Stapleton. 110 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. ' True, true ; it is most mysterious — un- accountable. I wish Henriette had not spoken about the chestnut being restless,' said Mrs. Dormer, now positively white with alarm. ' But I know Blanche to be a fearless and able rider,' observed her husband, to soothe her. Midnight passed. The ladies retired to wonder, surmise, and fill each other with fresh alarms ; the men lingered in the smoking-room, but did not think of bed. The darkness of night departed, and with it the storm. The day dawned and the morning came in serenely, showing the white mist curling up in the golden sheen from the vale of the Tees and many a grassy hollow, and showing also the trees considerably stripped and shorn of all their faded leaves by the violence of the wind ; and now mounted servants were sent forth to make inquiries. Two of these came speedily back with the tidings that just about sunset, or a little after it, a lady and gentleman answer- ing to the description of those lost or absent, and both mounted, had been seen tearing at A NIGHT OF ALARM. Ill frightful speed along the road near Barnard Castle — that their horses had evidently run off with them, terrified, probably, by the thunder ; and that the course taken by them was due north. Here was a clue to follow up without a moment's delay. The General, his two friends, and a mounted groom started at once to make further inquiries, and rode fast in the direc- tion indicated. From cottagers, toll-keepers, and workers hedging and ditching by the wayside, additional information was readily obtained ; and in one place Blanche's riding- * switch was found, in another her hat and veil near a dry-stone wall, a little breach in the top of which seemed to indicate that a horse had crossed there without completely clearing it in the flying leap. The stones, too, had been freshly dislodged. *How dreadful is this doubt and suspense!' exclaimed the old General, in a voice hoarse with emotion, as in imagination he pictured his beautiful young niece maimed or in agony, perhaps disfigured, crippled for life, it might be killed outright ; and how could 112 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. such terrible tidings ever be broken to her parents in India ! But if such a catastrophe had occurred, news must have come ere this to Thorsgill Hall, was his next idea ; and then a cry of absolute alarm escaped the old man when he saw in a ploughed field, distant some twenty miles from home, the chestnut horse of Blanche, with saddle reversed and bridle trailing, and, more than all, unable to move, having a leg broken above the off fore-fet- lock ! All this seemed to point to some dreadful occurrence. Meanwhile, where was she — that fairy-like creature with the golden hair — where her companion, and where his horse ? Its hoof-marks were distinctly trace- able to a certain part of the field. There were also found the marks of a man's foot, and of her smaller boot with its high instep and little brass heel, in the soft wet soil ; and after that all traces were lost. ' My God !' moaned the old gentleman, looking upward, * what can have happened ?' Stapleton tugged at his moustache more vigorously than ever. He was greatly per- A NIGHT OF ALARM. 113 plexed and really more alarmed now, for all these circumstances showed him that his secret idea of an elopement was no longer tenable. Eapidly and sadly General Dormer rode homeward, intent on telegraphing, and on reaching Thorsgill Hall found — that which we must reserve for a future chapter. VOL. I. 114 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. CHAPTEE X. WHAT HAPPENED. Meanwhile, during this time of suspense and alarm, where were we ? Miss Bingham's horse, having got the bridle-hit between his teeth, was completely beyond her control. The scared animal felt his own strength and mastery, and, wild with terror, rushed onward with unabated speed. My efforts to overtake him only seemed to make him worse, yet I could not for a single moment draw my reins, lest I should lose sight of his rider in the dark ; thus, wherever he bore her, I was compelled to follow. On one or two occasions. I got fairly abreast of him, going neck and neck, but could not, owing to the nature of the ground we traversed, reach her bridle. * Captain Kudkin, Captain Kudkin !' she WHAT HAPPENED, 115 exclaimed, with a catching sob ; ' if I lose my seat, I shall certainly be killed !' Anon her normal state of frolic broke out even here. "^ ^ I nearly came a cropper — nasty, that — over it like a bird, though — awkward drop — no crossing or looking before you leap here,' she would say, with something between a sob and a laugh in her throat, as we flew over some stone fence or hedge, that suddenly came before us in the gloom, and when we were landed safely on the other side of it. The pace was frightful; but more than once a gleam of lightning showed us the description of country we were crossing. Fortunately, much of it was now pasture land. The lights of Barnard Castle, with those of all its busy thread-mills, had dis- appeared in the obscurity behind us ; and I was in total ignorance of the direction we were forced to take, with all the haphazard excitement of the hunting- field exaggerated a hundredfold. Once Blanche was on the point of freeing her left foot from the stirrup, taking her right knee from the horn of the saddle, and I 2 116 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. throwing herself off — a perilous expedient, the idea of which she relinquished when I called to her to keep in the saddle as long as her horse could keep his feet. I thought of the poor girl's extreme beauty, and trembled lest aught should happen to mar it. Would I then love her the less ? Ah, no. But how dreadful it was to surmise if that fair face should be destroyed. Many other thoughts occurred to me, difficult to describe now or to disentangle, as they seemed — if such can be the case — to flash upon my mind simultaneously. After crossing a vast number of fields and pastures, causing many a covey of partridges to whirr up wildly from their places of shelter, clearing brooks and hedgerows, having left the perils I first mentioned far behind, we struck once more upon the highway, and as an ascent rose before us, I was not without hope that the devilish chestnut might become blown ; but just then a flash of lightning seemed to cross our very path. Again the thunder burst overhead, to rumble away in the distance, and again her horse uttered a snort of terror, WHAT HAPPENED. 117 and drove on with mad and headlong speed as before. Lights were now visible before us, their reflection glimmering in the gathering pools of water. We passed some rows of houses, the outlines of which seemed all blurred to view in the slanting rain ; but I recognised the little town of Brough, in the wild district of Stainmoor, with its ruined castle and ancient church, the clock of which was striking the hour of seven ; and now I found that we must have galloped many miles. Brough soon vanished behind us ; but fortunately the way was clear and free in front, the toll-bars were all open as yet, no vehicles were in the way, and no one was abroad who could avoid being out in such a storm. Blanche was becoming giddy, and begin- ning to feel that she could not much longer keep her seat. She was not fainting, however, for she was quite conscious ; but her over-taxed muscles were relaxing, and she felt certain that if anything caused her horse to swerve, start, or take an un- 118 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY, usual leap, she would be thrown from her saddle — it might be, to be dragged to death in the stirrup. A few miles farther on would, I knew, bring us to Appleby on the Eden, in Westmoreland ; but fortunately we were not taken so far. Just where another road crossed at right angles that which we were pursuing, a black gap in the dry stone wall seemed to open before us. It was a field gateway that proved to be open ; and beyond lay a great space of deep moist fallow-land, which had been recently ploughed ; and over this her still half-frantic horse strove — but strove in vain — to continue at the same speed. His strength and courage bore him on a little way — some hundred yards or so — and then his pace began to slacken quickly ; he breathed and laboured heavily — so did mine, especially when I began to shorten my reins to check him fairly. Anon the chestnut plunged heavily down on his head, while a fierce snort, as if of pain, escaped him ; but he rose again, partly in obedience to the bridle-hand of his rider. Once more WHAT HAPPENED. 119 the animal sank forward, but partly on his off side, while Blanche, gathering all her energies at that instant for a last effort, lightly and adroitly sprang from her saddle, to fall half fainting among the soft wet furrows of the field. Pulling up my now breathless horse, I instantly alighted, threw the reins over my left arm, and approaching, lifted her ten- derly up, and all wet, sodden, and weary as she was, she felt for a minute or two the impossibility of keeping her head, which was now bare, from resting on my shoulder, while one or two almost hysterical sobs^ escaped her. The delight of the moment was certainly chilled in more ways than one — by my natural alarm lest she might ultimately suffer, and by the unpleasant accessory of the falling rain; but I thanked Heaven in my heart that she was safe — safe from bruise, or maim, or injury; and next moment, in a burst of anger, I administered four or five heavy lashes with my whip upon her panting horse, which never moved, but lay gathered in a heap, as it were, amid the furrows. 120 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY, When I thought over all the obstacles we had cleared in the dark, our mutual escape seemed mu^aculous. I looked round me in utter bewilderment. What was to be done now ? The wind had died away, but the rain was continuing to fall, and more heavily than ever ; not a star was to be seen, and darkness alone was visible. To remain, then, a moment longer than was necessary in a ploughed field at such a time and season was impossible. Blanche, however, was equal to the occasion, and promptly said she would make an effort to walk. She gathered her heavy skirt over one arm, laid the other upon mine ere I could offer it, and we proceeded vaguely in search of that which seemed hopeless — shelter. My chief idea was to reach some country inn, where a vehicle could be procured, or where I could leave her in safety while I rode back to the Hall to report our little catastrophe to the General. That we should neither return until we did so together on the morrow, did not occur to me, amid all my surmises. WHAT HAPPENED. 121 My heart was yet full of anxiety for what she was suffering; and I was sincerely thankful when, after a time, the barking of a large dog, and then the appearance of two or three lights, shimmering and seeming blurred through the rain, announced our vicinity to some habitation ; for in that dis- trict of high rugged prominences and large tracts of low peat moss, of land covered with oak, alder, ash, and hazel, mansions and cottages are not sown so thickly as in Surrey or Middlesex. We had quitted the field, and found a beaten pathway, which we pursued for some time, till among some clumps of trees and through the blackness of the night there suddenly appeared the blacker mass of a large house, in the basement story of which the lights we had seen were shining. No ray of light appeared elsewhere. In front of the mansion was a poi'te-cochere of stately aspect. Under its arches, I half led and half supported my dripping and sinking companion, and while my horse's hoofs clanked heavily enough on the pavement beneath them to have roused even sleepers, 122 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. I applied my hand vigorously to an iron knob I discovered, and the notes of a large bell responded sonorously in the distance. After considerable delay, which rendered me so impatient that I rang again and again, footsteps were heard, and then a ray of light streamed brightly out through a large key- hole. One half of the large folding- door was opened; the ghostly depth of a long and darkened entrance-hall was seen beyond, and in the immediate foregro'und an old man, who looked like a gardener — and afterwards proved to be such — appeared with an upheld candle flaring in his hand, and with some- thing of angry inquiry expressed in his weather-beaten face, while behind him were two female domestics, who eyed us with more surprise and distrust than commiseration. Without waiting to question them or be questioned, for time pressed, I gave the old man the bridle of my horse, and led Blanche Bingham right into the hall of this — to us as yet — unknown mansion. * We have had an accident — a runaway horse — you see the plight this young lady is in,' said I hurriedly, in explanation ; * she WHAT HAPPENED. 123 must have instant change and shelter, for which I shall reward you well, good people ; and meantime have the goodness to take my card — if the rain has left me one — to your master.' 124 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. CHAPTEK XI. ' THE SITUATION HAD ITS CHAKM.' We had not, as in old romances, lighted upon the residence of robbers or coiners or madmen, of ghosts or ogres, but a snug old English household, where the delicacy of Blanche, together with her evidently helpless condition, readily excited the sympathy of these people, who instantly saw that she was a lady of position ; and one of them, who, by her black- silk dress, lace cap, portly aspect, and comely visage, appeared to be a matronly old housekeeper, informed me that, save one or two rooms, the whole house was shut up, the furniture shrouded in brown holland, and the lustres in linen bags, as the family was absent ; but that nevertheless we were welcome, and should be instantly attended to, while the gardener took my horse round to the stable-yard. ' THE SITUATION HAD ITS CHARM: 125 While Blanche Bingham was led away by one of the servants, the housekeeper ushered me into a cosy room, in the grate of which — most welcome sight ! — a jovial fire was blazing up the chimney. This apartment was ample in its dimensions, and its decora- tions, which were rich, were of the style of the second George's era. The walls were diyided into compartments by moulded panels, on which were painted landscapes, ruins, allegories and armorial bearings, all so highly varnished that the surface of the now almost black wainscot glittered in the firelight. • Beneath the heavy surbase or chair-belt were other devices, and at intervals there rose from it heavily-fluted pilasters, sup- porting the gilded cornice and ceiling, which was also divided into dark panelling. The furniture, however, was modern, and the draperies of the windows were deep crimson ; and so ruddy was the blaze of the fire in the low old-fashioned grate, that it quite eclipsed the light of two tall candles on the table, and four others which were now placed in the crystal girandoles on the mantelpiece, over 126 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. which, on a high prancing white horse, was the portrait of an officer of the Marquis of Granby's clays, in a Kevenhiiller hat and enormous jack-boots. Opposite hung a full-length painting of a smart-looking young fellow in Eifle uniform, with his sword under his left arm, a shako in his left hand, and the smoke of some imaginary battle rolling darkly in the distance. * By Jove, that is a face I should know !' said I, pointing to it ; 'I find myself among friends here.' It was the young squire, the old dame told me, now far away in the Indies among the Turks and heathens. * Tom Prior of ours — I know him well,* said I, scanning the familiar features of a brother officer ; * and is this his father's house ?' ' Yes, sir— Stoke Priory ; but the old squire and my lady are now in Paris.' The nursery was above this room, she went on to say, in a communicative manner' that would soon have become garrulous, but I was in no mood to listen to her ; there 'THE SITUATION HAD ITS CHARM: 127 Master Tom used to make such a racket ! But there had been no Httle ones there since then, and that was years ago. She seemed a kind old north-country woman, and I could well imagine how she must have spoiled and petted * Master Tom,' now one of the most self-possessed and confident young fellows in the P. C.'s Own Eifie Brigade ; but though Stoke Priory bears rather an important place in our story, as we were never under its roof again, suffice it to say that, though taking its name from some wooden priory of the Saxon times, it was a great square ungainly-looking mansion of» the prosaic days of George II., when taste was at its lowest ebb in Britain. On learning that I was a guest of General Dormer at Thorsgill Hall, and that the young lady whom I had brought hither in a plight so miserable was his niece, the attentions of the good woman were redoubled; but I was startled to find that no messenger could be sent to the Hall for the carriage that night. The only man about the place was Giles Stocks, the gardener, and he was too old ; so there was 128 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. nothing for it but to wait patiently till morn- ing, or ride back myself through the pelting storm ; but the temptation to remain with her proved too great, and so I stayed. Meantime I was accommodated with dry clothing, as some of Tom Prior's wardrobe was still extant in his old rooms. Some refreshments were spread for us, with warm coffee for the young lady and brandy for me ; and at last we were left together and — alone ■ — to look into each other's faces and endea- vour to recall some of the tender expressions which, in my regard and terror for her, had escaped me, the former in spite of myself, during our wild career through the darkness. Somehow it seemed like a dream and scarcely a reality to me that she was seated there beside me, in a loose white morning wrapper, over the dry clothing provided for her in haste, but which — though a world too wide for her — showed much more than we usually saw of her milk-white neck and arms ; her little feet in slippers planted cosily on the fender ; her head reclined back in a crimson-velvet chair, with all the wealth 'THE SITUATION HAD ITS CHARM: 129 of her golden hair, unloosened to dry, hanging in a rippling shower behind it, or curling over her shoulders. Every way how charming and piquante she looked ! * Such an adventure this is !' said she, with a little laugh that was almost hysterical ; * they will think that we are lost altogether, Captain Rudkin.' * At the Hall ?' I asked, scarcely knowing what to say. ' Yes, where else could I mean ? Oh, it's all like an adventure in some old story-book. But we can in no way help our being here. The circumstances were all beyond our own control/ *And might have ended tragically — fear- fully so,' said I. In the glare of the fire her fair face and dress of white came strongly out from the dark background of the sombrely-pannelled and redly-curtained room. Her lips were half parted with a smile at our whole situa- tion, which certainly had its charm, to me especially. As I gazed upon her, I almost began to VOL. I. K 130 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. fancy that we were never to part. Our perfect isolation was suggestive of thoughts that were ahke perplexing and alluring ; and — dreamer that I was then ! — I loved to imagine that we had been actually married that morning; had the benediction and the usual shower of old slippers. Was this the beginning of the honeymoon ? Was this cosily-wainscoted room ours in some lone country inn, whither we had come to be secluded from all the world ? Was this the — no, no ! It was indeed but a momentary dream, and home to-morrow we should have to go, with our strange explanations, to Thorsgill Hall ; while of the natural terror and suspense of those we had left there, I felt for the time quite oblivious, as I drew close to her side. Nine o'clock struck sonorously from a great old-fashioned clock on the echoing stone staircase. I had fully displayed by word and deed, by expression of eye and tone of voice, so deep an interest in her escape and in all she had suffered — a manifestation all unchecked — that I could not fail to feel encouraged to ' THE SITUATION HAD ITS CHARM : 131 go farther; thus before the hour I have mentioned had struck, I had told her — in those broken accents which cannot be com- mitted to paper without exciting ridicule, even that of those who would dearly dote on hearing such poured into their own ears — that I loved her, loved her dearly, and more than all, I had amply won her permission to do so. Her face was verv near mine ; how it happened I never knew, but in another moment our lips were pressed together ; and from that instant it was all over with me. I fondly trusted it was the first kiss she had ever received from any man, save her doating old father ; and thus began the most delicious idyl of my life. One promise she made me give, which, circumstanced as we both were, seemed natural enough — that our engagement should as yet remain unknown to her relations at Thorsgill Hall. To this I acceded, and to what proposition of hers would not I have done so then ? We were indeed joyously happy, though India was still before us, and we could not K 2 132 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. foresee our destiny, our kismet, as the natives call it there. After some minutes' silence she said, while colouring deeply, on returning as it were from poetry to plain prose : ' Oh, such a brute that chestnut is ! I thought, by his jerking at the reins and shaking the bit, he had a mind to be off with me ; and so he was/ ' There were more than the chestnut in that mood, though in a different fashion,' said I, while drawing her dear head caress- ingly on my shoulder. *My arms,' she continued, pulling up a sleeve in a way that was very bewildering, ' oh, how weary they are with tugging at the reins ! and see my poor little hands, how red!' 'And yet how pretty they are in their present pinkness !' I exclaimed, while kiss- ing them with an emotion that bordered on idolatry. * My darling, my darling ! I swore to save you — ' * Or perish in the attempt, as the novels have it.' * I have succeeded to a certain extent/ ' THE SITUATION HAD ITS CHARM: 183 * And a rare scrape we are in !' At that time, how far off the world, acquaintances, friends, relations, and every- thing seemed from us ! Even by me Hen- riette Guise was as completely forgotten as though she had never existed, until Blanche, after a little pause, said suddenly and coyly, * And you do not — I mean did not — love my cousin Henriette ?' ' Oh, no, not at all,' I replied, but with some secret compunction nevertheless, as a pale, soft, and sweet face, with its dark deep eyes, so full of sentiment, reflection, and penetration, " now came before me. ' What , has led you to ask this ?' ' Her letters, and, more than once, your own manner.' ' Ah, no, no ; I have admired her certainly — as who would not ? — but no word of love has ever escaped me.' And this alone was true. ' Escaped you ?' she queried. * Were you, then, so cautious?' * Admiration is not love,' said I. * I admired her; but, oh, Blanche, I love you, and all iny future life is merged in yours.' 134 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. My lips were close to her ear; her face was nestling in my neck, and I stroked half fatuously the moist masses of her golden hair that streamed over me. * Blanche, Blanche, you will always loye me ? It is delightful to hear you repeat it; ' The situation is so sudden, I scarcely know what I am saying, Lancelot.' 'Call me Lance,' I urged. ' Dearest Lance, then.' ' And you love me ?' ' Oh, how often am I to tell you that I do!' ' Bless you for saying so !' ' I fear that you will prove very exacting. But now I must leave you, dear delightful Lance, for there is that tiresome old clock wheezing and striking again — eleven, actu- ally eleven — and we are in a strange house !' She rang for her candlestick and at- tendant, and the entrance of the old house- keeper, nathless her genial and bustling manner, looking rather sleepy in her lace cap and silk gown, brought us back to the prosy world once more ; and it became ' TB.E SITUATION HAD ITS CHARM: 135 evident, from some blundering remarks which escaped her, that she was puzzled to know whether or not we were married, till suddenly she saw there was no plain hoop on the particular finger where, ere long, I hoped to place one ; and with one of her merriest silver laughs at the doubt, Blanche Bingham bade me ' Good-night.' The door closed, and she was gone, leaving me in that mood of happiness on which it is useless to elaborate. 136 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. CHAPTEKXIL ACCEPTED. How I got through the night I never knew; but I suppose I must have slept, and without even a dream of what had oc- curred since we cantered down the avenue of Thorsgill Hall. With the first blush of dawn, a sense of my new happiness rushed upon me — the conviction that Blanche loved me, and was mine as far as avowed love and solemn promises could make her. With mo- mentary self-reproach, I now began to think of Henriette Guise and her haunt- ing face, and what she may, nay must, have expected from me, and the point to which our intercourse for two months past had evidently been leading up ; but this emotion, a passing one, was quickly dismissed and forgotten, so absorbed was I in the complete ACCEPTED. 137 success of my love affair with her more sparkhng, and, in some respects, more attractive cousin. Though every incident of the past night was strongly and vividly impressed upon my mind, my new position seemed somewhat like a dream, the truth of which would not be realized until I met Blanche again and held her hands in mine. I sprang from bed and looked out upon the landscape. The sun was high in the heavens ; the storm had passed away, and the whole aspect of nature was serene and calm, though a silvery mist yet lingered on the summits of the green hills that rise oj)posite Appleby. Stoke Priory stands on somewhat high ground ; thus the view from it embraces a vast extent of country, dotted by farmhouses and small villages covered with blue slate and whitened with white- wash, irregularly shaped fields spreading up the mountain sides, and almost invariably divided by stone walls — genuine Westmore- land scenery. From the green shady valleys the mist, occasioned by the rain overnight, was curl- 138 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. ing slowly upward in the sunshine, and as morning was advancing, I thought that be- times a messenger should be despatched to our friends at the Hall. Giles Stocks and another yokel now came to me, while I was dressing, with informa- tion that they had found the chestnut lying in the fallow held, in a wretched plight, and had been compelled to leave it, as it lashed out viciously with its hind legs whenever they approached. They thought at first that it would not rise, ' because some horses were main obstinate after a fall, and won't do so till it suits their fancy,' till they found that the poor beast's off leg was broken, and that there was nothing for it now but to give it a bullet through the head, or a good stroke with an axe. Of course I could have neither done with- out the permission of General Dormer. I knew how much the quiet jog-trot life at Thorsgill would be startled from its propriety by the whole episode of last night, and with- out farther delay wrote the General a hurried note, telling him of all that had occurred — all, at least, save the sweet element that ACCEPTED. 139 Blanche and I had infused in the adventure — and begged, as there was no vehicle to be had in our vicinity, that the carriage might be sent for us. Then I proceeded to make the best toilet I could achieve prior to meet- ing my intended again. It was on his returning, in a great state of distress and perplexity, that the General found my mounted messenger awaiting him, and discovered also, to his surprise, that had he prosecuted his inquiries but a little way beyond the field where his chestnut lay, he might have come upon Blanche and me, seated over our coffee and eggs, in the sama cosy room where we had passed the evening so delightfully and auspiciously, and where we now sat hand in hand, awaiting — yet not impatiently — the arrival of the carriage. Though Blanche was, for her years, somewhat of a practical girl with all her espleglerie of manner, she dearly loved aught that savoured of romance, and in this adventure of ours there was a strong soupcon of it, so she liked the situation and yielded to it completely. ^ But now, dearest Lance, ' she began con- 140 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. fidentially and in a low earnest voice, ' our engagement — is it not delicious to speak of it ?' she asked parenthetically, while blushing — ' must be, as I said last night, kept secret.' 'May I not tell even the General — your good old uncle ?' ' Neither him nor aunt Dormer as yet, I think.' ' As you will, darling ; I trust to your discretion.' ' And to time. Lance love ; to time and the influence you may have with my papa. I am sure mamma could no more resist you than I have done ; and my remembrance of her is, that she was very, kind, tender and affectionate.' ' Could your mother be otherwise ?', ' You have no need to flatter me noiv,' ' But why all this fear and caution ?' I asked. * You are a captain, to be sure, darling ; but I know too well, from all aunt Dormer tells me, that collector or commissioner would sound better than even colonel in the ears of papa, who is terribly commercial in his views.' ACCEPTED. 141 I winced a little at all this, and recalled the General's hints about the wealth, ambition, and ' views ' of Henriette's family, and deemed my chances there would have been small indeed — an heiress, watched by a dragon of a mamma. ' You have glorious hair, Blanche,' said I, after a pause, as I toyed with it. 'All my own, too, and not, according to the usual story, cut off my head during an illness and made up for me to wear when well again. See !'^ — and with her quick little fingers she undid a coil of wondrous length, that fell far below her waist. ^ * Dearest, dearest Blanche, you are indeed a fairy-like creature !' ' Stop, Lance darling — don't ; there comes the carriage, with aunt in it. Oh, I hope she did not see you !' In two minutes afterwards the General and Mrs. Dormer arrived, with little Poplin, the lady's maid, carrying suitable habili- ments for Miss Bingham, who was warmly embraced by them in turn; and it was a joyous sight to see the golden hair I so much admired mingling with the silver 142 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. locks of her old uncle, as he clasped her agam and agam to his breast, with her fair face nestling in his neck. The warm-hearted old man actually shed tears, and from his great affection for her I augured happily of his influence on our mutual future. The chestnut was sentenced to be shot, an event over which Blanche, who had frequently ridden the horse, and almost daily had fed him with apples from her own pretty hand, shed ' some natural tears,' till she remembered that ^ it was a wicked brute, and might have cost us both our lives/ Yet don't we owe it a debt of gratitude, after all, dearest Lance ?' she whispered coyly to me, when driving home merrily in the carriage. With the plan we had formed for our future arrangements, and that our engage- ment was to be a secret for a time, we found ere long a serious difficulty in addressing each other with sufficient formality in the presence of others; and that something had occurred between us, Henriette Guise could not mistake. The flirting manner of Blanche had completely disappeared; she ACCEPTED. 143 had become graver, and I more tender. A certain brilliant and happy expression shone in her eyes whenever they met mine ; while my bearing, in spite of myself, must have revealed that delightful consciousness of proprietary, which a successful and accepted suitor often finds it so difficult to conceal. My passing love for Henriette had been a silent one, and so no one could accuse me of having behaved ill. One feature in our circle at the Hall puzzled me. It was an unmistakable tone and air of irritation, if not disdain, in the manner of Colonel Stapleton whenever our* little episode was referred to, as it was most naturally for some days after its occurrence. To use a common phrase, he evidently * felt sore ' on the subject. * What the deuce can it be to him ?' thought I. * Is the fellow in love with her too, and have I supplanted him ?' Eemembering the ring, so suspiciously like one of his, which I had seen Blanche wearing when first she came to the Hall, I was half inclined to think so. I had not, however, the bad taste to ask about that 144 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. jewel ; but lost no time in presenting her with one of mine, a fine rose -diamond, and received from her dear hand another, which was necessarily so tiny that I had to get it enlarged. ( 145 ) CHAPTER XIII. A MEMORY OF THE CRIMEA. Blanche usually wore several rings, but no one save her cousin, with whom she was as familiar as a sister, detected, or recognised, the strange one which now she wore con- stantly with scrupulous fidelity on her engaged finger ; and Henriette's expression of face changed visibly, though she sought to con- ceal it by a smile, when she took Blanche's hand in hers, and turned the jewel round, as if to assure herself, one wet day when we were all gathered near the fire in the library, idling over books and portfolios of prints, before 'tiffin,' as the General called luncheon. 'What a beautiful diamond!' she said in a low voice that Blanche alone heard ; ' you have not been in the habit of wearing it hitherto.' VOL. I. L 146 . FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. ' No, not until I came here/ was the eva- sive reply. ' It has a story, then ?' ' A story which I shall tell you some day,' said Blanche ; adding hurriedly and some- what awkwardly, to change the subject, ' Dear Henriette, how pale and weary you look !' * Perhaps I feel so,' replied her cousin, while her proud lip quivered a little. ' How— why ?' ' One gets weary of everything in this world, at times.' ' Don't say so, at your years and mine ; how absurd of vou, Henriette.' * But think of that night of terror, and the effect it had upon us all,' said Henriette, raising her voice a little. * Are you, or were you ever weary of life, Captain Kudkin ?' asked Blanche, looking up with a bright expression of eye, which I thought I alone could read ; but which, how- ever, Stapleton detected. * Your question is a strange one,' said I ; ' but I did feel weary of life sometimes, when in the Crimea.' A MEMORY OF THE CRIMEA, 147 * Just after Chillian wallah — ' the General was beginning, to the great alarm of us all, when Stapleton said abruptly, * By the way, Eudkin, you were among the first who went there ?' * I had the honour to be.' * And yet you were not at the Alma ?' he continued, in a somewhat marked tone. ^ True, I was not. You have been study- ing '^ Hart," I presume ?' * No ; but how were you absent ?' ^ Because I had a bullet in my body.' (* Lancelot dearest !' almost escaped Blanche.) ^ ' Before Alma ?' again queried the Colonel, in the same unpleasant tone. * Precisely ; I had the honour to be the first officer wounded in the war. ' Where ?' ^ At Bulganack, which was a mere prelude — a tuning of fiddles, as it were — before the more glorious passage of the Alma river. I was then in the cavalry, and had I been more prudent, I might have been in the cavalry still,' I added in an explanatory tone to Blanche, who said eagerly, L 2 148 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. * Do tell US all about it ; your wound, I mean/ * The story of my mishap will include that of another — something of love and a sister of charity, the episode of whose life was more interesting than mine ; and as young ladies have tired of music, the gentlemen of knock- ing the halls about at the billiard- table, and getting through a wet forenoon by the medium of cavendish in the smoking-room and stables, I may as well try to kill an hour for you all.' The Colonel, who was neither bright nor brilliant, but whom a phrenologist would have said to possess two qualities, extreme reticence and powerful concentration — useful gifts when combined with that which he, with all his bravery, did not possess, an honest heart — twitched his moustache im- patiently at my preamble ; which seemed greatly to whet the curiosity of the ladies, who all listened ^attentively while I related the following episode, which occurred in the then recent war in the Crimea. As you all know, it was on the 14th of September that the allied army landed in A MEMOBY OF THE CRIMEA. 149 the Crimea, near the lake of Kamishhi, some miles north of the Bnlganack river. All got safely on shore except a boat-load of Zouaves, who were run down by a steam transport, and sent floundering to the bottom, with hairy knapsacks, blankets, red breeches, and all. Leaping mid-leg deep into the surf, Guardsmen and Highlanders, Eifles, Lan- cers, and Hussars, quitted their boats and scrambled to the beach, where all were formed rapidly by troops or companies into regiments and brigades on the open shore, which there was overhung by cliffs more than a hundred feet in height. • Though our cavalry force, always lu- dicrously slender, had been reduced at Varna by disease to little more than a thousand sabres, the disembarkation of their horses — all saddled, bridled, and accoutred — was a task of no small difficulty and danger. I shall briefly skip over the miserable night of rain which we . passed, without a tent to cover us, on that bleak and open beach, exposed to the chill blasts from the Euxine ; each soldier sleeping as best he could, with his musket beside him, save the 150 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. muffled outposts, who had their arms 're- versed;' each trooper standing by his horse in the ranks. As the pitiless rain came pouring down in one unceasing torrent, my poor charger shook his ears from time to time, and his mane too, as if to protest against the cruelty of the colonel, of the Horse Guards, or of his rider, in subjecting him to all this discomfort and annoyance ; while I, muffled in my cloak, which was soon soaked with water, with my head resting on a holster-flap, and an arm twisted in a stirrup-leather, strove to snatch the pro- verbial ' forty winks ' before the trumpets sounded to advance, and the working parties began to dig graves for those unfortunates who had perished in the night of cholera; for thus grimly did the angels of suffering and death inaugurate our useless war in the Crimea. Amid the sodden corpses — sodden with the rain of that most miserable night — we saw on her Imees a little French sister of charity, whose pale face, as she prayed, with her eyes closed, and her white fingers telling the beads of her black rosary, impressed me A MEMORY OF THE CRIMEA. 151 strongly by the character of its beauty, sweet- ness, and resignation ; and as I checked my horse for a moment to observe her, I could little foresee how much I was yet to know of Sister Louise Marie, for so she was named. The atmosphere of the morning was calm and serene, but mist was curling in the sunshine from the wet bivouac where sixty thousand men had passed the night. Far away on our right, the dark smoke from the funnels of the allied fleet rose like mighty columns high into the blue sky of the Euxine. The music of the many regi- mental bands rang pleasantly out upon tli^ softened air ; and while advancing, we be- came sensible of an agreeable odour that pervaded it, as the feet of the marching men trod down the leaves of the wild lavender, and certain aromatic herbs which grew over all the ground traversed by the army. As we began to move towards Sebastopol, I had the good luck, with a few troopers of my regiment, to be exploring for water with the gallant Nolan, when we came sud- .denly upon a Kussian convoy of no less than 152 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. eighty waggons laden with flour. This was our first view of the enemy, and so our ex- citement was keen and hie^h. "With a hearty British hurrah, we routed the Cossack guard sahre a la main, cut down half a dozen of them, and brought the prizes safely into camp. I was with the advanced guard, which consisted of the 11th Hussars, and ours, the 13th Light Dragoons. We moved in columns of troops at deploying distance, and in our rear followed a party of Kifles, extended in skirmishing order, for though broken and undulating, the country was open, and, so far as we could see, destitute of trees. Everv officer and soldier had three days' ration of salt pork and biscuit in his havresack. These had been issued to us before we left the shipping. The time was a keenly exciting one. We knew that a Eussian army was somewhere between us and Sebastopol, the point for which we were bound ; but ivhere we knew not exactly, and full of irrepressible surmises and suggestions, some of the officers and men were talking in the ranks, when suddenly A MEMORY OF THE CBIMEA. 153 that strict disciplinarian, Lord Cardigan, who rode at the head of the 11th said, * Silence — and eyes front ! There are Cos- sack videttes in sight.' I swept the horizon with my telescope, and could discern on the summit of a green ridge, defined darkly and distinctly against the sky, the figures of ten or twelve Cossacks, riding at equi- distance, with their knees up to their holsters, so short were their stirrups ; their backs bent, and their heads cased in round fur caps, thrust so far forward as to be almost between the ears of their shaggy ponies. They were scarcely visible, whe» they wheeled about and vanished to the rear with their lance-heads flashing in the sun. * These videttes, from their number, seem to indicate the presence of a large force,' said the Earl to Captain Nolan. ^ So every moment I expect to see the flying artillery come up,' responded the latter, his eyes sparkling and the blood mantling in his cheek, as hotly as it did on the fatal day when he fell in the death-ride at Balaclava. No cannon, however, appeared, and under 154 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. a now burning sun the forward march went on. We were half afraid to eat our salt rations, as no water was to be had; the springs had been dried up a month before, and the verdure had almost disappeared, for the heat was a hundred degrees in the shade. I turned in my saddle and looked rearward, to where our scarlet columns of infantry, so firm and compact, came on with colours flying and bayonets glittering in the sun. Along all this line of march were men lying here and there behind them, their red coats dotting the route we had come. Many of these were victims in the first stages of cholera, the ghastly scourge that had followed us from Yarna. They lay with their jackets torn open, their stocks unclasped, their parched tongues protruding, their distorted faces blackening in the sunshine, while the army marched on and onward still, and while the Alpine vulture from the marble rocks of Kamishlu looked expectantly on the banquet that was to come. The greatest number of these victims who fell by the wayside under disease or fatigue seemed to belong to the Household Brigade, A MEMORY OF THE CRIMEA, 155 and with the aid of my field-glass I could see the same sister of charity, in her black dress and quaint white hood, on her knees busy among those unfortunate fellows, who were fated never to march more in this world, consoling them, and, so far as her means permitted, supplying their wants. Ere long a cheer rent the air, when we came in sight of a cool stream rippling pleasantly between grassy banks and groves of wild olive and pomegranate trees, tur- pentine and caper bushes. It was a lovely evening then, and the setting sun was wreathed in clouds of gold and amber. The* infantry halted, piled arms, and, breaking their ranks, rushed forward to slake the thirst that maddened them — the Highland Brigade alone waited for the command of Sir Colin Campbell, who halted them at some distance from the stream, that they might fill their canteens in an orderly manner ; while, less fortunate, we, the 13th Light Dragoons with the 11th Hussars, wearing then their blue jackets and scarlet pelisses, all elaborately braided with gold, in attend- ance upon old Lord Eagian, had to ride 156 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. far on in advance of the First Division of infantry to reconnoitre, as fresh groups of Cossacks had been visible, with their lances glinting on the brow of a neighbouring hill. An alarm was now sent to the rear, whither I was despatched with an order, in consequence of which, making a dreadful clatter with their limbers, spare wheels, buckets, rammers, sponges, and forge waggons, the flying artillery went thunder- ing to the front. Just where the road from Sebastopol to the landing place at Eupatoria crosses the river called the Bulganack, it traverses a number of grassy slopes and undulations ; and over these, after splashing through the stream, the Hussars and ours rode boldly ; but it was not until we had surmounted the last of them that we became suddenly aware of more than two thousand Kussian cavalry advancing in line to meet us, . with their skirmishers in front in extended order, and with carbines unslung. On a signal from Lord Eaglan, his orderly trumpeter sounded a halt, and we all reined up, and each man looked with a grim smile A MEMORY OF THE CRIMEA, 157 in his comrade's face, so mucli as to say, * Tiie time has come !' * Forward, skirmishers,' cried Lord Car- digan ; ^ the Brigade will form line to the front.' On the flank of each squadron the brass trumpets rang shrilly out as we deployed into line, and the men selected for skirmish- ing darted out at full speed, unslinging their carbines as they went, and dressing from the flanks as strictly as they would have done in Maidstone barrack-yard, for even when under fire the lessons of the drill-sergeant are rarely forgotten. • In rear of this formidable line of Eussian cavalry rose another swelling eminence, be- yond which were distinctly visible the glittering tips of a long line of bayonets ; for there concealed, and quietly waiting till we should be lured within range of musketry, were the six battalions of the 17th Infantry Division, each a thousand strong, with two batteries of artillery, and no less than nine sotnias of Cossacks ; so the little force which formed the British advance guard was thus suddenly placed in a perilous and dreadful 158 FAIREE THAN A FAIRY. dilemma. In short, it was menaced with total capture or destruction. ' What the deuce is to be done ?' asked the Quartermaster General, who was the first to discover the whole situation. ^ How are we to avoid an action, and yet with honour cover the retreat of the llth and 13th Dragoons ?' But now the 8th Hussars and the 17th Lancers, v/ith all their bannerets flutter- ing, and our nine-pounder field batteries were sweeping up to support us ; and the Muscovite infantry, fearing that a much greater force was among the hollows in our rear, and that consequently they might fall into the same snare they had prepared for us, remained quietly behind the eminence, while the skirmishers on each side opened that desultory fire which with dragoons is usually so ineffective ; but as there was every pros- pect of our being charged by the heavy cavalry, we were ordered to fall back by alternate squadrons ; and the moment this retrogade movement began, the Eussian artillery came rumbling out of the hollow at a gallop. The guns were wheeled A MEMORY OF THE CRIMEA. 159 round, the limbers cast off in a trice, and a cannonade was instantly opened on us. Then gap after gap appeared in the ranks of the 11th and 13th, as rider and horse went floundering down, shot dead or to roll about in mortal agony, for cannon-shot wounds are usually fatal; and, as we fell back in this regular but protracted order, the round bullets ploughed and ripped up the turf about our horses' hoofs. A cornet who carried our regimental standard was unhorsed by a nine- pound shot, which disembowelled the animal he rode ; he lay half under it, unable to release himself, and, as we continued to retire, there was every prospect of his falling into the hands of the butcherly Eussians. * Poor Tom Dacres !' said the squadron leader ; ^ he is done for.' ' And the standard will be taken !' ex- claimed the Colonel, who was perhaps more concerned for the honour of the regiment than for Dacres' safety ; ' those devils are already within pistol range of it. It is lost !' 'It is not,' said I, as a sudden burst of 160 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. enthusiasm seized me, and I was anxious to rescue Dacres, who was one of the best fellows in the regiment, and, moreover, was * the only son of his mother, and she was a widow,' far, far away in fenny Lincoln- shire. ' I shall retake it, even if in their hands.' * Dare you attempt this ? ' ^No.' * What then, Eudkin ?' ' I shall do it. Colonel, and that is better than attempting. Who will follow me to the rear T The whole squadron would have volun- teered, but I quickly selected three brave fellows, and wheeling round our horses we galloped back to where, pale, half stunned, and half breathless, poor Dacres lay on his back, with both his legs and the standard too under his dead horse, which in its last agony had rolled over him just as he had freed his feet from the stirrups. Without dismount- ing, we dragged him up by our hands and the standard with him ; but shot after shot whistled about us, and ere I had time to think of it, one of these killed my horse A MEMORY OF THE CRIMEA. 161 under me, and another struck me in the chest just as I left the saddle, and I fell, but staggered up, only to fall again, while the idea flashed upon me and took utterance on my lips : ^0 God, am I to fall already — to die so soon ?' It was, though momentary, a bitter con- viction, in the prime of health and life to leave so suddenly this pleasant world, to be among the first to perish in our new career of glory, after escaping the charnel-house at Varna, or a grave in the Yale of Aladdyn. A blindness, that was momentary too, came upon me, and when I looked again from the ground where I lay, I could see the thrSe dragoons who had followed me (one bear- ing the recovered standard) rejoining the Brigade. There was a fourth, who was afoot, and whom I knew to be Dacres, safe, while I had all the bitterness of being help- less and abandoned, for, as I afterwards learned, they believed I had been killed. But little time was left me for reflection, as I was almost immediately surrounded by a crowd of ferocious -looking Kussian dra- goons, clad in coarse green uniforms braided VOL. I. M 162 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. with yellow, and wearing glazed helmets, under the peaks of which but little more of face than their red snub noses and massive black beards was visible. Blow after blow was dealt me, chiefly about the shako and on the plates of my epaulettes, till, choking, in blood, I fell again on the turf, and for some time was quite insensible. "When I recovered, the moon was shining brightly in a cloudless sky, and all around me the scenery was as visible as it would have been at noonday. Scared doubtless by the din of the recent cannonading and carbine firing, the birds were still twittering about in the caper bushes and laurels on the bank of the Bulganack, the current of which I could see shining and rippling as it flowed away towards the Euxine. Our advanced guard of cavalry, together with the staff and flying artillery, had fallen back upon the camp, and I was left lying there alone on the ground where the first passage of arms had taken place between our troops and those of Kussia — a passage now forgotten amid the greater splendour of the Alma ; yet not altogether was I alone, for near me lay the A MEMORY OF THE CRIMEA. 163 bodies of those who had fallen. Thev were already stripped by the Tartar peasantry, and lay gleaming, white, still, and ghastly under the steady radiance of the moon. Two dead horses, Dacres' charger and mine, lay near me, but denuded of all their dragoon trappings. How I had escaped the plunderers I know not ; but only my epaulettes, sash, and sword were gone. The pain in my chest was most oppressive. I thought I was dying now, and felt quite resigned ; more than I should now, for then I had no one in whom — (I checked the speech that was about to follow, as my eyes involuntarily met those of Blanche, which were full of the tenderest commiseration.) I lay still and with eyes closed, for at that dread moment the border land of shadows — the land of the Great Uncertainty — seemed terribly near indeed. " Helas, mort sur le champ d'honneur!' said a soft voice near me. My head was tenderly raised, as if the speaker wished to test whether I was really gone, and on looking up, I saw bending over M 2 164 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. me on her knees the sweet sad face of Sister Louise Marie, the little French soeur de charite, who was already so well-known to our troops at Varna by her innumerable acts of goodness, kindness, benevolence, and Christian bravery. Her little face seemed very white, and whiter still her great quaint hood in the moonlight ; but blood again choked me, my eyes closed, and though the pain of my wound resembled something like a red-hot sword rankling in my breast, I became a second time unconscious. When once more I came back to the world, the sun was shining brightly; the pain in my chest was greatly alleviated, for somehow, unknown to me, the ball had been extracted by Doctor Thompson, of the 44th — the glorious ^ surgeon of the Alma ' — he who remained voluntarily with that terrible grey acre of Kussian wounded, and perished with the most of them. A soft pad secured by a bandage had stopped further haemorrhage. Again my head was gently lifted up, a cooling drink was given me, and this after a time enabled me to look around. A MEMORY OF THE CRIMEA, 165 I was lying on a species of pallet or camp- bed, on the clay floor of a Tartar cottage ; an edifice usually excavated out of the slope of a steep hill or bank, in proportion to the accommodation required. This saves the expense of a back wall, and the angles are filled up by baked mud. The roof which thus projects out of the hill is quite flat, and supported by posts, thus forming a pleasant verandah. Through the open windows of such an edifice as this, and beyond these posts, which were covered with vine-leaves and flowering creepers, I could see, stretching in distance far away, and steeped in the light of a sunny noon, the rocky vale through which the Bulganack wanders to the Black Sea. In one corner of this rude apartment, which was almost destitute of furniture, as the place had been looted by Kussian foragers, crouched a Tartar woman, wearing a white fereedje, grinding corn with a handmill ; her dark glittering eyes fixed on me from time to time with vague wonder. In another, on a low divan and quite motionless, was seated the sister of charity, reading intently a little 166 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. book, red-edged, with a cross on the boards ; a Breviary to all appearance. The pure and regular profile of her little face, which was familiar to me now, was fully displayed, as the hood of her head-dress was folded back ; and as she sat in the blaze 'of sunshine that streamed through the unglazed winddw, I could see that her face, though young and beautiful — so beautiful that her grim attire of black serge, over which flowed the cape of her unshapely white coif, failed to mar it — though very peaceful and divine in its expression, yet bore traces of care that had been premature, and suffering that had been great; though there were times when she could seem happy, merry, and cheerful ; for with her the bitterness of all the past had gone out of her life. Her eyes were dark, and their lashes long and black, though her hair was of the richest brown. On the marriage finger of the left hand I afterwards detected two wedding rings, which I thought singular, as the religious wear but one; so Sister Louise Marie had evidently a story. Slight though the mere motion was of A MEMORY OF THE CRIMEA. 167 turning on my pillow, it arrested her atten- tion ; and hurrying to my bedside she knelt down with a cup of Crimskoi wine-and- water. 'Where am I, mademoiselle ?' I asked faintly. * You must not call me mademoiselle, as if I were a great lady or a waiting-maid,' she replied, smiling. ' What then '? * Your sister.' ' Sister Louise Marie ?' * Ah, you know me then ?' she exclaimed, with a still brighter smile. * 1^0 w you ! ah, who in Bulgaria and m the Valley of the Plague did not know you ? You are an angel on earth !' ' Hush ! you go too far. Would that T merited such a character ! But you must not speak — more than all if you are going to be impious ; and I, monsieur, who am to be your nurse, must control you.' * My nurse — you ?' Then she told, with many a pretty little French gesticulation of manner, that with the aid of two soldiers, less severely wounded 168 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY, than myself, she had conveyed me to a cottage at Biilganack, where the ball had been easily extracted ; and that she had been left there in charge of me and six other sick and wounded soldiers — four British and two French ; and then, lest' I sliould talk too much, she left me for a time, after playfully putting her small soft hands upon my eyelids, and saying, ^ Tenez-vous bien tranquille— fermez les yeux ' (Be still, and close your eyes). Though alleviated, as I have said, the pain of my wound was still great. There seemed to be a load crushing down my chest with every respiration ; but hope now began to gather prayerfully in my heart that I should yet get well, and forget my chances of being helplessly murdered by Tartar shepherds, Greek robbers, or prowiing Cossacks. As the faces of my comrades came in succession before me, I longed to be in the saddle, and once again among them ; but ere that could be, I knew that, alas, many must fall never to rise again, as it was evident that a general action was inevitable ere a few days elapsed. A MEMORY OF THE CRIMEA. 1G9 Without further aid from the surgeon, who had simply given his directions to her, I was left entirely to the care of Sister Louise Marie ; and certainly no real sister, no wife or mother, could have nursed me more ten- derly ; though doubtless she was quite as heedful of the unfortunates who occupied the adjacent huts. Though very subdued in manner, she was full of pretty and engaging ways. * Call me your little sister,' she would sometimes say. And more than once, when I was half asleep, she dipped a finger in a little font which she had hung near my bed, and crossed me on the forehead with holy water. 'Sister Louise, you treat me quite as if I were a child,' said I ; ' what a tender mother you would be !' She became, if possible, more pale than usual when I said this. A little spasm crossed her face, and her eyelids drooped as she folded her hands upon her breast — hands that, notwithstanding all the menial work she did for us, were as white as your own, Miss Bingham; and looking up to 170 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. heaven, she said in a voice that was inex- pressibly touching : ' I have been both wife and mother, monsieur, in the days when I never thought to be a sister of charity.' ' A wife — a mother — you ?' I repeated, with surprise, as her face seemed so young and girhsh. * Why do these words surprise you, mon ami ?' * Because I could not have supposed all this.' * I am alone in the world now ; I have none to care for save those who suffer, and you are one of them.' 'In your tender hands, dear Sister Louise, my sufferings are fast passing away — a few weeks more must see me well and strong ; but were I to live a thousand years, I shall never, never forget you.' She looked at me and smiled sadly at my earnestness ; and now I knew that she had a story to tell ; but it proved a very simple one. ' What was your husband, may I ask. Sister Louise ?' said I, after a pause. A MEMORY OF THE CRIMEA. 171 * A soldier like yourself — an officer of the lOtli Kegiment of Chasseurs a Pied.' ' And his name ?' I asked, to lure her on. * Louis-Kene Morin.' Her voice trembled as she repeated the name of one who was doubtless so dear to her once, but only a sad and beloved memory now, though she had nearly learned to veil all emotion under a calm and usually cheer- ful exterior. ' And your child ?' ' I had — two.' Then ' the iron seemed to enter her soul ;' and while her lips moved as if she wa^ muttering some silent prayer, her thick black eyelashes became moist and matted with the large tears that welled up unbidden. * And they — ' * Are in heaven now, monsieur, mon frere,' she replied hastily ; and again her soft dark eyes were cast upward with an expression alike beautiful and divine. ' See, mon ami, see,' said she, as her tremulous little hands drew out of her bosom what seemed to me at first a bunch of charms attached to a blue- silk ribbon; but 172 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. which proved to be Httle consecrated medals, a tmy crucifix, and a gold locket containing three locks of hair. Two of these were fair, one being golden, the other quite flaxen ; and no doubt with all her cultivated air of resignation, this locket was the most precious reliquary she possessed, as it held all that remained on earth of the little tendrils that had crept and twined them- selves around the mother's heart ; though she consoled herself that they were in heaven, and praying there for poor lonely maman in her weeds as a sister of charity. ' Tell me how all these sorrows came to pass ?' said I, taking her hand caressingly in mine. ' My story may be compressed into a few sentences,' said she; and while fixing her eyes downward on the clay floor of the Tartar hut, instead of looking at me, she began thus, or rather somewhat in this fashion. ( 173 ) CHAPTER XIV. THE SISTER OF CHARITY. I AM now twenty- four years of age. When in my mere girlhood, I became a happy wife : oh, can it be that but six years have passed since then — six years that seem as ages now ! — and since I had a Httle boy who called me mother, a cherub with rosy cheeks and golden curls, who was just beginning to lisp and prattle, when my second great sorrow came — a child sent me to replace the loss of my first little Eene, whose hair was so flaxen and silky. mon Dieu ! I can see them both yet — the last more plainly than the first — more vividly even as when I held him up to receive his father's kiss-— the farewell kiss of my Louis, so handsome, brave, and tender, as he marched in- haste with his regiment from Avignon to Paris, where there was soon 174 FATRER THAN A FAIRY. to be enacted that terrible coup cVctat; for the 10th Chasseurs a Pied proved to be one of those corps on whom the Emperor, then Prince President of the Eepublic, mainly relied for support against the citizens. For two years we had lived in happiness at Avignon, and then time softened to me the blow I had suffered in the loss of my first little baby. We were not in the barracks at the Papal Palace, but — though our means were limited — rented a pretty cottage on a green slope, at the base of which, between vineyards and rose-gardens, flowed the Khone. In memory I can see it yet, that secluded abode, half buried amid honeysuckle and jasmine, with its charming little flower- garden, where Louis' comrades, who had served with him under Canrobert in Africa, often came to smoke, play chess or dominoes, accompany me at the piano, or play with my little boy, for the Chasseurs were as kind- hearted and happy fellows as they were brave ; and in fancy, too, I can see dear, quaint old Avignon, with all its embattled walls and towers, and the belfry of the THE SISTER OF CHARITY. 175 Cordeliers, where Petrarch first saw Laura ; the sterile rocks of Vauchise, Mont Yentoux, ever beautiful with vegetation though its head is veiled in snow, and the undulating hills all green with vineyards and groves of olive and mulberry trees — a scene on which my eyes shall never look again, nor should I desire to do so, now that all whom I loved are gone. My heart seemed to go with the Chasseurs as the echoes of their drums died away on the Paris road. The regiment, I have said, march hurriedly and in haste, and I was left alone with my child and full of keen anxiety, for whispers came of terrible things that were expected in Paris ; but no sure tidings reached me. No letters came ; the telegraph wires were cut in many places ; in others the rails were torn up ; the news- papers dared not print much intelligence ; the mails were most uncertain ; so we, in that remote province, knew little or nothing of what was being done elsewhere, till long after it was past and over. As the days stole slowly on and became weeks, how anxiously I reckoned them and 176 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. longed for my dear Louis ! and how I missed his happy comrades — merry Jules Perreau, who won his epaulettes when fighting with the 64th against Abou Maza in Africa ; Emile de Castellain, who had the deadly encounter with two Sheiks in the terrible Djerma Pass, and slew them both ; and who, though a great, brawny, and bearded captain, was the very slave of a pretty wife, whose little white feet he would have worshipped, had she commanded him to do so ; and then there was handsome Francois Guerin, w^ho led his company so bravely at Narah, where the fierce Arabs had their nests like eagles among the rocks, and who died of fever in the Yale of Aladdyn, raving alternately in prayer to the Blessed Virgin, and in fancied love speeches to Mademoiselle Pompon, the dancer at the Porte St. Martin. Alas, how sad it was ! I nursed and laid them all in their graves at Yarna — horrible Yarna ! Time, I have said, passed on, but there came no tidings from Paris — no letters from my husband ; but one night — oh, I shall never forget it! — I heard the sound of THE SISTER OF CHARITY. 177 shrieks, of maledictions and musketry, near my cottage, where cowering I lay abed, with little Louis nestling in my breast. After a time these terrible noises passed away, and all became ominously still ; but I had heard that the people were full of wrath against the troops of the Kepublic ; and that the troops hated and despised the citizens, and that hence many fugitives and deserters were tracked and murdered on the highways. I feared that something dreadful must have taken place in my vicinity; that my husband might be returning to me and — but no — no ! I thrust the idea aside, as not to be dwelt upon. • Peeping forth fearfully in the early morn- ing, while all Avignon lay sunk in purple shadow, and the Ehone looked so deep and blue, I saw at the bottom of our little garden the body of a man in uniform. It was not the light green and gold of the Chasseurs, but dark blue embroidered with oak-leaves, the costume of a French general. He was not, as I at first surmised, dead ; but sorely exhausted from wounds, bruises, and toil. He had, no doubt, been assailed VOL. I. N 178 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. by some of the turbulent peasantry, and would be so again if discovered by them. I roused him, and, assisting him with my little strength, laid him on the only bed my cottage contained. I bathed and bound up his wounds, in suspecting the source , of which I had been right. He was a fugitive from Paris, seeking to escape from France ; for, after he was able to speak, so he told me, and of the terrible events which had recently taken place there. He related that the Prince President, aided by St. Arnaud and Fleury, had resolved to coerce the Constitutionists, and with this view had swept into prison at Paris every statesman and general who was in any way eminent for public spirit and ability ; that he. General Baron Loisel, would have shared the same fate had he not successfully found concealment. Louis Napoleon was then declared Dictator of France, and the selected regiments were marched into the streets by General Canrobert, who commenced an in- discriminate massacre to strike terror into the Parisians, two thousand of whom were shot on the Boulevards, though barricades THE SISTER OF CHARITY. 179 were thrown up and resistance offered by many armed men. The 10th Chasseurs a Pied — how my heart leaped at their name ! — had thrice stormed a barricade which he with all who adhered to him had thrown up in the Boulevard Pois- sonniere, using in its construction omnibuses overturned and filledrwith stones, beds, pianos, and other furniture from the adjacent houses : thrice it was stormed, and twice retaken. With his own hand he (Baron Loisel) had sabred or shot down four of the officers of the Chasseurs ; but the barrier was carried at last, and all its defenders fled for shelter into the nearest houses. Then the Chasseurs poured volleys of musketry through the shutters of the closed windows, compelling all who were therein to lie flat on the floor. The house in which he had sought refuge was forcibly entered, the door being blown open by musket-balls, and every human being in it was bayoneted, save himself, regardless of their prayers and screams for mercy. He lay secure and unseen under a shop-counter till darkness fell, after which N 2 180 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. he made his escape from the city, and was on his way to the frontier when assailed at night by some armed peasantry, who, in pursuance of their feud with the army, had fired on him in mere wantonness because he was in uniform. So there had been fighting in Paris, the 10th had been severely engaged, and at least four of their officers had fallen, and by the hand of this man ! All this gave me cause for much and terrible reflection. Perhaps this man's weapon had reached the heart of my husband, in whose very bed I was now nursing and restoring him that he might continue his flight to Switzerland, though errors and alarms had brought him to Avignon out of his direct route. He further told me that a very hopeless exile was before him, unless his old comrade St. Arnaud, to whom he wrote without delay, stood his friend with Louis Napoleon. None of his wounds were very severe, so he recovered rapidly. One night, when he was convalescent, little Louis in his night-dress was kneeling on my knee, with his rosy dimpled hands THE SISTEB OF CHARITY. 181 clasped before him, and I was teaching him to beg of God that when he died he might join his baby brother Eene, who had gone to heaven before him. After a pause the child turned to where the Baron, seated in a chair, was regarding us with mingled interest and emotion. * T shall pray for you too, monsieur,' said Louis. ' Why for me, child ?' he asked. 'Because you are a soldier, like my father.' And after he had lisped a few words after me, the Baron rose and said : * What is his name, madame ?' ' Louis, monsieur.' * On this his eyes filled with tears, and taking the wondering child in his arms, he kissed him, and said : * I too have a Louis, a little fellow just his age, whom I have left in Paris, and never more may see, unless St. Arnaud befriends me ; and there too I have a young wife, who doubtless mourns for me as dead.' We had now a kind of common sympathy between us, though there were times when a foreboding seized me, and I could not help 182 FAIFitm THAN A FAIRY. shuddering. Oh, could it be possible that my Louis was one of the four officers who had fallen by his hand ? One morning a messenger reached my cottage bearing a letter, the contents of which filled my patient with joy. It was from St. Arnaud, and enclosed the full pardon of Louis Napoleon ; so the Baron prepared to return at once to Paris, where he promised gratefully and faithfully to search for my husband, of whom I heard nothing for two months. A fortnight more passed away in aching and grinding anxiety, and then a letter came to me from the General. It was brief, and said : * I have found your husband ; come to him without delay.' He had found my dear, dear Louis ; but how ? — dead or alive, wounded or in cap- tivity ? The letter was painfully, tantalis- ingiy curt ; but there was not a moment to be lost now. Collecting all the little money I had, I took my child in my arms, and locking the door of our beloved cottage near the Rhone, with its roof and walls a leafy THE SISTER OF CHARITY. 183 mass of climbing roses, creeper, jasmine, and vine, all blended together and alive with little singing birds, without visiting poor baby's grave at St. Pierre, I set out for Paris, with a heart swollen by one great and absorbing anxiety — my husband's fate. I had often to travel afoot, for I was too poor to take the rail always ; but Heaven supported me, otherwise I know not how I should have got over the vast distance which lies between Avignon and the capital, when my forebodings proved to be fearfully correct. Baron Loisel, true to his promise, had searched and found niy husband, lying severely wounded in a common hospital of the city — wounded by four balls fired from his revolver at the barricade in the Boulevard Poissonniere — and had conveyed him to his own house in a fashionable suburb, and there I found him— but oh, how changed ! — care- fully attended by the best surgeons in Paris, surrounded by every remedy, luxury, and appliance that the grateful Baron could provide ; but, alas, he was sinking fast. "Why dwell on this ? 184 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. His wounds were mortal ; he did not live twelve hours after I saw him, and just as the Angelus bells were ringing out upon the air, he expired with his head upon my breast, and clasping our child's hand in his own. I felt as if it was all a maddening dreara — a nightmare from which I must awake to find myself in our dear cottage again, and that the sound I heard was not the hum of Paris, but the murmur of the Khone. Half my life seemed to have left me, and to have gone with him into the darkness of eternity, when I sat beside his premature grave in Pere la Chaise, that wilderness of crosses, flowers, and obelisks ; but I strove to pluck up courage, for my child yet was with me — left but for a time only. My trials and miseries were not yet over. My little Louis sickened and died ; I laid him beside his father, and then I was alone, and without an object in the world — most terribly alone. There seemed nothing worth living for now, and never more would I return to Avignon, where every object must remind me poignantly of those I had lost. But ' blessed are they that mourn, for they THE SISTER OF CHARITY. 185 shall be comforted ;' so in time there came peace to my heart, with a great love of charity to all who were in sorrow or suffering. I adopted the habit I now wear^and so am here. The girl's face — for in truth she was but little more than a girl — was full of holy beauty as she ended her simple story; but it spoke of the sadness of the unforgotten past, blended with a divine hope for the future, and in her long-lashed eyes and on her lips there seemed to hover the very spirit of the words she had quoted. Thus it was, that she wore two plafn rings ; the first her husband's wedding gift, the second as a religieuse. I quitted Bulganack when convalescent ; but instead of going to the hospital at Scutari, or idling about Pera, I rejoined my regiment in the camp of the Light Brigade, or all that remained of it after Balaclava ; and when next I saw Sister Louise Marie, she had found her true home — one that was far beyond the grave. One morning after a fearful storm of snow 186 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. and biting wind, I had breakfasted on some half- ground coffee, boiled in a camp-kettle lid, and instantly mounted, as I had to ride on duty to the French camp. As I passed the huts and tall poplar trees of Balaclava on my left, the . rear of the Turkish defences and batteries, and Lord Raglan's headquarters (a large farm- house with some vineyards), and then rode in a north-westerly direction to- wards the right flank of the French army, the cold blast that swept over the snowy waste from the Black Sea was beyond conception bitter and paralysing, though I was well provided against it, in a thick pilot coat, a furred hood, and long Crimean boots, together with some of those cosy cuffs, comforters, and muffatees which the kind girls of England sent us, and every way looking as unlike a smart Light Dragoon as possible ; and strange to say, notwith- standing the intensity of the cold, where" ever the ground was bare, the bulbous roots, especially the purple crocus and snowdrop, were sprouting. On the sheltered or lee side of an old THE SISTER OF CHARITY, 187 ruined wall in a lonely place, I saw a dark object lying amid the snow, and on drawing nearer, discovered it to be a woman — a sister of charity, either torpid with cold or frozen dead. Springing from my horse, I fomid the latter to be the case, and more than all, as I drew back her hood, that this victim to her Christian duties and the horror of our winter camp was poor little Louise Marie, who had nursed me so tenderly at Bulganack — she who had ever been so cheerful and hopeful, so placid and sweetly content. I was deeply moved, familiar as we were then with death and suffering, on making this painful and startling discovery. Her eyes were closed, or very nearly so ; thus she must have passed away in a species of sleep or torpor, the result of exhaustion and cold, and darkly the long black lashes lay on her cheeks, now paler than marble, pale as the snowflakes that rested on her dress. Her small white hands, that had never wearied in the performance of kind offices to the sick or suffering, were now, as I had often seen them, crossed upon 188 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. her breast. One grasped her rosary, and her Httle bunch of reHcs which I had seen at Bulganack, with the locket that contained her children's hair ; the other held a little basket which held some medicines with which she had no doubt been going on one of her errands of mercy, when her delicate nature had succumbed to those severities she was so ill calculated to endure ; and so she had perished thus miserably and helplessly in the night, though eighty thousand French- men were almost within hail of the place where she lay. I galloped to their camp, and returned with a few of the 6th Zouaves ; and these rough fellows, all bronzed and bearded, were deeply moved, some of them to tears, as they dug her last bed in the snow-covered ground. Muffling her in my cloak — other coffin or shroud there was none — we buried her in the habit of her order, and all her little relics with her; and as they covered her up, a corporal, a stately man, on the breast of whose tattered jacket were the medals he had won under Canrobert at Mascara and Oj-an, uncovered his now grizzled head to TRE SISTER OF CHARITY. 189 the winter blast, and read with reverence from his missal the prayers for the dead. Each man then raised his right hand in salute and we separated in haste, for already a rocket soaring high in the grey leaden atmosphere announced that a simultaneous cannonade was to be opened on Sebastopol from all points at once. That soldiers should be buried in heaps, and lie over each other in ghastly tiers after a battle, seemed only the natural order of events ; but somehow, of all our graves in the Crimea, the last home of that little French sister of charity, within sound of the adverse batteries at Sebastopol, seemed to me the most uncouth. Her miserable fate made a deep impression upon me even then, though King Death was ever at our elbows, and we recked but little of him. '* So the long-drawn days had ended Of the lonely loveless life Of a bride — the bride of heaven — Always bride, but never wife." More than once, when relating this brief memory of the Crimea, I had been interrupted by pretty little expressions of well-bred com- 190 FAIRER THAN A FATRY. miseration from the ladies, and when steal- ing a glance at Blanche, I had detected tears in her dear eyes at certain parts of it, but more particularly at that passage where I had been unhorsed and shot down ; and this manifestation of tenderness intensely grati- fied me, though her manner was as gay as ever. * I thank you for your story, dearest Lance,' she whispered as she passed me, adding aloud, ' you have certainly whiled away an hour of a wet day, after we had become ennuyed with music and ourselves, the racing game, and cockamaroo to boot.' * Thus it was, Colonel, in consequence of the bullet which led to my acquaintance with the French sister of charity, that I was not at the Alma,' said I, with some point to Staple- ton, who, having been anxious for billiards, had listened to me with an impatience which he did not care much to disguise ; but his long moustaches found him some occupation the while ; and at 'tiffin,' the General, as I fully expected, told us that after Chilianwal- lah some such adventure as mine had occurred to Eummun Singh, the subadahr major of THE SISTER OF CHARITY. 191 his regiment, the difference being that his nurse was not a sister of charity, but a deuced pretty Nautch girl, who had missed her troupe, and been strolHng near the field. I did not quite see the resemblance ; but the worthy old General's associations of ideas were often singular, as they all tended to India in general, and the famous field in particular. 192 FAIHER THAN A FAIRY. CHAPTEK XV. DAY DREAMS. A TIME is coming when I shall have to record more startling events than friendly gather- ings round the library fire, flirting speeches, or love-making ; for we — the actors, at least, in this little life -drama — were all bound for India, where a perilous time indeed was be- fore us. Such is the inconstancy of our nature, and so selfish is the human heart at times, that in the absorption of my new passion for Blanche Bingham, I was quite oblivious of any pain my attentions might inflict on her cousin, the gentle Henriette, whom I had at one time been so solicitous to please. If — as at one time I had hoped and flattered myself — she had been beginning to love me, during the months of our past pleasant intimacy at Thorsgill Hall, she DAY DREAMS. 193 must now have become painfully sensible of considerable neglect, in the omission of attentions which she had been wont to re- ceive from me, and not quite as a matter of course ; for a heart that loves is subtle in discovering this, ' and women,' says a female writer, ' being perhaps less humanised than men, retain many of the simple forms of animal instincts still ; and, somehow, in- stinct seldomer makes mistakes than pure reason in this kind of matter.' Is it unreasoning egotism to admit that, in the exultation of my new proprietary and successful love affair, I actually felt as if I had something to revenge upon her for the petty episode in the conservatory with Colonel Stapleton, and furthermore for the fragment of the conversation overheard when the cousins were gathering the rose-leaves ? And there were times, when I was hovering about or conversing with my fair fiancee, that I have found her quiet dark eyes regarding us with something of sadness, if not disdain, in their expression ; and then only did a sentiment of reproach occur to me, though saying in my heart the while — for Blanche VOL. I. O 194 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. had fairly taken it by storm — ' Thank Heaven I did not go too far, and so commit myself !' I, who had so many miserable doubts con- cerning the future with Henriette, had not, or seemed to have none so far as her more volatile cousin was concerned. I had- taken a leap in the dark and proposed blindly, trusting to Fate and those Parcse the Horse Guards, and, like Micawber, that * something would turn up ' for me in India. I was full of happiness certainly ; but true it is * that seldom can one reap joy in this world, without entailing sorrow on another ;' and though I foresaw it not then, Henriette's hour of retribution was to come, when I was to suffer for the vanity in which I was in- dulging then. So deeply did the passion for Blanche inspire me, that my life seemed only to date from the time she came to Thorsgill Hall, but a few weeks back. Beyond that period, all seemed a chaos, a cloudy and unprofitable waste ; and though I looked forward with dread to the temporary sepa- ration which was inevitable, I longed with impatience to bridge it over, if possible, by DAY DREAMS. 195 activity — to rejoin, to embark and to sail for India, where alone I could win her, and where I trusted that some kind spirit would smile upon our fortunes ; ' for,' as she once whispered to me, * I would not have our marriage spoken of as a '^bread-and-cheese one," dearest Lance. But in my perfect assurance of her love, I had no doubt of everything being possible ; and even schemed in my heart that, if her family objected on the plea of funds, and that I was only a captain of Eifles, I should persuade Blanche to marry, and march up country in spite of them. I was too ab^ sorbed to see a difficulty in anything. Would she prefer love in camp and quar- ters — a barrack or a bungalow to a palace at Garden Eeach ; and being carried in a palanquin, slung on two bamboo poles, to a handsome carriage and pair in Chow- ringhee ? Time ere long would show. ' Such a pity it is that those girls are going away so far as India,' said Howard, one day when their departure began to be spoken of. *Yes,' replied Stapleton, ' and ''as bloom- 2 196 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. ing candidates for matrimonial preferment." They will not be in Calcutta a month before both are engaged, and all the more readily that they don't require to shake the pagoda tree.' How was it that the Colonel's tone always jarred upon my ear ? Where was now my former jealousy of this personage, who, it seemed to me, since the advent of Blanche's arrival, had addicted himself more than ever to dangling about Miss Guise ? Yet I began to perceive, after a time, that our tall tawny- haired friend was covertly unpleasant in his manner when I was by the side of my intended. * The deuce !' thought I ; * does the fellow mean to rival me with both ? Henriette was somewhat of an attraction to him before ; can she be less so now ?' Stapleton was undoubtedly a well-bred man ; hence a tone of half compliment, half banter, and covert insouciance, which he adopted at times when he conversed with Blanche, seemed to me very inexplicable, unless it could be that he* felt secretly irritated by the mode in which he was men- DAY DREAMS. 197 tioned in her letter from Brighton. This bearing galled and annoyed me the more that I had no acknowledged right to resent it, and I knew him to be a blase man of the world ; hence I was not sorry when he announced one morning that his presence was required in town, when he would be a week at * the Rag,' previous to rejoining at Chatham. He took his departure by the up- train, and I saw him no more till we met in Bengal, under very different circumstances. Now our happy little circle at Thorsgill Hall — my visit to which was indeed one of those events in life described by Moore as a green spot in the waste of memory — was about to be broken up, and perhaps, small though it was, never to meet all together again. India was before most of us — India with its vastness of empire and extent; and happy it was for us that we could not lift the veil of the future, that hid the horrors of the coming mutiny. The Howards left us for London, and then came a night when I heard, with an in- difference that at one time would have 198 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. astonished me, that Henriette Guise was to leave us on the morrow to visit Mrs. Apple - ton, her future chaperone. This sudden announcement took all at the Hall by surprise — all, at least, save one, though I obtained a clue to it ere long. ' Why would she not wait for her cousin Blanche, that they might travel together T asked her uncle and aunt. But Henriette, though she shed abundance of tears at a leavetaking that would too probably be a final one in this world, was quietly and resolutely determined to quit Thorsgill Hall. Mrs. Poplin did the requisite packing, and the preparations for her departure were soon complete ; but ere it took place we had a somewhat startling episode. ( 199 ) CHAPTER XVL CONTAINING SOMETHING OF THE * OLD, OLD STORY.' Some of the incidents connected with this flying visit to Thorsgill Hall may seem trivial ; but they became nevertheless full of importance in the time to come — at least to the author of these pages. On the night before her departure, Heiv riette Guise excelled herself in her toilet, though ' all her things ' were packed up. How charmingly her dark hair was smoothed and dressed around her graceful head ! Indian bracelets, the last gifts of General Dormer, glittered on her white arms ; and round and white her shoulders came out of the maize-coloured dress that fitted her to perfection, while the blush - rose that nestled over her left ear looked as fresh and sweet as herself. Well might aunt 200 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. Dormer — I had already mentally adopted her as a relation — say, * Darling, you are looking your very best to-night !' And, sooth to say, she was doing so. She was unusually gay. I thought the girl was glad to be going, and I could not ,help reflecting how nearly it had been that she and I might not have been parting thus ; and so my thoughts went back to that sunny evening when we were seated in the bay window of the library, and when I was on the very verge of a proposal, encouraged by the confiding manner in which she replaced her hand in mine, after suddenly with- drawing it. For some time past she had generally evaded me ; or perhaps it might have been that I had become indifferent to her move- ments, so completely was I absorbed in those of another ; but on this night — the last, too probably, we should ever spend together — she was unusually frank and friendly with me. As I turned from her and gazed on Blanche, nestling with girlish grace and childlike affection close by the old General, THE 'OLD, OLD STORY: 201 over whose face smiles seemed to ripple at some of the things she was saying to him, the thought occurred to me. was I acting fairly to him in contracting a secret engage- ment with his niece, while under his own roof, and without his knowledge ? But it was Blanche herself who had sealed my lips, and pledged me to secrecy for a time. The General and his wife — a kind old couple indeed — doted on these two beautiful girls ; all the more that their own little ones had all passed away in childhood, and found their graves at various up-country stations in the Punjaub and elsewhere. Suddenly the old man left Blanche's side, and crossed the drawing-room to where Henriette was seated on the sofa with me, talking of such commonplace matters as the requirements for the overland route. He took her white face caressingly between his brown hands, and kissing her tenderly on the forehead, said. ' This is the last night you may be in Thorsgill Hall for years to come, my dear, dear girl ; and though whatever we are doing for the last time has generally something of 202 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. sadness in it, let me hear you sing again ; just once again, Henriette.' * "With pleasure, clearest uncle ; but what shall it be T ' Anything you please.' * Something merry ?' ' Well, I would rather not ; for though that wag Blanche has been making me laugh, I am far from feeling merry when I know that your place here will be vacant to- morrow, and I feel by. anticipation how lonely the old house will be without you all/ * Then I shall sing you something very, very sad,' she replied, smiling brightly, as she seated herself at the piano. I rose to be of service, as usual, but she simply bowed and said, ' Thanks, no ; I do not require music, as I shall sing from memory.' On this I retired to my seat, and Henriette at once commenced a little lyrical piece, the accompaniment to which was very beautiful. It seemed a very singular song for a young girl to sing, and her mode of execution, with the sweetness of the melody, rather than the THE 'OLD, OLD STORY: 203 words, actually moved me; but there was always a seductive cadence in the voice of Henriette Guise. At first I suspected that it was some composition of her own ; but she assured me afterwards that it was from the pen of an unknown or forgotten Scottish writer, and now I can only recall two of the verses : ' Oh, would that the wind that is sweeping now O'er the restless and weary wave Were swaying the leaves of the cypress-bough O'er the calm of my early grave ! And my heart, with its pulses of fire and life, Oh, would it were still as stone ! I am weary, weary of all the strife And the selfish world I have known. I only sigh for a bright quiet spot In the churchyard by the stream, "Whereon the morning sunbeams float, And the stars at midnight dream ; Where only Nature's sounds may wake The sacred and silent air. And only her beautiful things may break Through the long grass waving there.' Her voice seemed to become a little tremulous as she concluded, but she left the piano with one of her brightest smiles, and said : ' How silent you all are ! A song is often a 204 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. signal for general conversation. I fear that I have made you quite melancholy, and this may be ominous to one having a long journey before her.' * Good heavens, where did you pick up that grave-digger's ditty, Henriette ?' asked Blanche. ' It sounded like some horrible dirge.' ^Yet, my dear girl, you sang it very sweetly,' said the General, playfully pinching the chin of the performer, who soon after rose to retire. ' Good night. Captain Eudkin,' said she, with a gaiety of manner that was far from flattering ; * or rather, I should say good- bye,' she added, ' as I leave this place so early that I shall not see you to-morrow.' ' So soon ?' I stammered. 'Yes, very early. I must, if possible, catch the '^ Flying Scotchman " at Darling- ton ; and too probably we shall never meet again, though we matj hear of each other.' ' Good-bye then ; but not for ever, I hope,' said I, smiling too, while I thought, con- sidering my future relations with Blanche in Calcutta, of the certainty we should have of THE 'OLD, OLD STORY: 205 seeing each other a good deal, for then I must become by aUiance a cousin also. Her hand, so soft and shapely, touched mine for a moment. Sweet was her manner and calm her smile, as with a farewell bow she withdrew, accompanied by her aunt and uncle, who had some matters on which to confer with her, or some final arrangements to make ; and so I was left alone with Blanche, while the song and inscrutable bearing of Henriette seemed, I knew not why, to haunt me reproachfully. This emotion was very fleetmg, for another little hand, quite as soft and shapely, stole into mine, a bright face came nestling clo^e to my cheek, and Blanche said in her most winning tone : * Lance, will you always love me as you do now ?' *Why do you ask me such a question, Blanche ?' said I softly, while looking into her dear confiding eyes, after one quick glance to see that the curtains of the drawing-room arch were still close. ' Forgive me, darling ; but I am so happy that I tremble — ' 206 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. * Tremble, Blanche — for what ?' * The future ; I cannot help it. I love you and Henriette too, all the more that you are so good without being a bit stupid,/ * Blanche !' * Well — because stupidity and goodness so often go together ; but, Lance, I do love you!' Sweet are the lips that tell us — not in words alone — how dear we are ; yet words are precious too — most precious to remember. 'And now good-night, my own one,' she whispered. ' I must follow my cousin — good- night.' In the intoxication of such whispers, and with the fondling of these dear hands, what was the departure of Henriette to me ? Blanche disappeared, and I was left for a time to revel in my own happy thoughts. ( 207 ) CHAPTER. XVII. THE COUSINS. * Tears, cousin/ said Blanche, on perceiving that the former had been weeping when she joined her in her dressing-room ; ' but it is natural — you are leaving us, Henriette.' * Aunt is so dear — uncle so kind — and I may never see them more,' she replied hurriedly, and not without a little air of annoyance. Of late there had not been much of the mutual confidence that had hitherto existed between the cousins ; but on this night, as it was the last they could spend together at Thorsgill Hall before their departure to India, after Mrs. Poplin had been dismissed, Blanche, while caressing in her lap a little black- and-tan terrier I had given her, with silver collar and bell — a creature so tiny that it could pass through a stirrup-iron — sat in 208 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. her dressing robe by Henriette's bed-room fire, chatting with all her usual gaiety ; while the latter with her nimble white fingers coiledj up the silky masses of her dark hair for the night. One might readily have thought .that beauty such as theirs, though so different in its character, did not require much enhancement ; yet upon the toilette-table, which, like its great oval mirror, was grace- fully draped in rose-coloured silk and white lace, lay innumerable pieces of jewellery, cut- glass bottles full of mysterious essences and compounds, and all the etcetera that Kimmel and the best shops in Bond Street can furnish — requirements which, if absolutely necessary, were quite enough to have made my barrack-room and bungalow prospects vanish in thin smoke. It is scarcely etiquette, I fear, to report conversations or private confidences between young ladies when in, or nearly in, their night-dresses, when their back hair is all undone, and their pretty feet, half slippered, are planted on the warm fender, and the merits or demerits of their male friends are THE COUSINS. 209 under review, together with matches, engage- ments, lovers, honeymoons, and everything save cats^ poodles, and parrots ; but without some such breach of etiquette, how is chapter xvii. to be written, or my story told ? ' Accept that pearl spray for your dark hair, Henriette, said Blanche ; ' it does not suit mine.' ' Thanks, dear cousin,' replied Henriette, laying the jewel, the effect of which she had been trying, back into its case ; ' but I cannot think of depriving you of it.' * Why ?' * It is so valuable.' ^ I have plenty of other ornaments — enough and to spare ; moreover, pearls don't suit me. You remember that Eudkin admired you with it on the first night you wore it, as you told me, so do pray keep it.' 'A thousand thanks, dear Blanche,' said Henriette, putting her arms round her cousin's neck from behind, and kissing the crown of her head. ' Yes, he did admire its effect,' she continued, replacing the spray for a moment amid her dark hair, and glancing at her side face coquettishly in the mirror. VOL. I. p 210 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. * So he told me,' said Blanche, as she ran her fairy fingers through the rippling masses of her golden hair ; * and then Colonel Stapleton — ' ' I was so glad when he went away,' inter- rupted Henriette. * I am seldom deceived in my first impressions of men, and to me there seemed always something sinister and insincere about it — yet he can be very taking in manner, I grant you ; however, his sudden attentions bored rather than flattered me.' ' Sudden, were they?' * Somewhat so.' ' I thought he was rather given to ignoring ladies — rejoicing in the freedom of bachelor- hood, and turning up his single -blessed nose at matrimony.' ' I never thought he had any views in that way, at least so far as I was concerned,' said Henriette frankly ; ' and then there was poor simple Mr. Howard — I think he was a silent admirer of us both.' ' Too silent for my taste,' said Blanche, tossing up the terrier to catch it again in her lap. THE COUSINS. 211 ' But he was quiet and gentle — very like his mother, I think.' * Yes, very like, so far as want of beard and whiskers go.' ' Blanche, what odd things you say ! Captain Rudkin seems hopelessly smitten with you.' ' Perhaps,' replied the other carelessly ; * but it is useless, you know, cousin.' Henriette eyed her keenly for a moment, but Blanche was smiling into the fire. Then turning suddenly, as if struck by some as- sociation of ideas, she asked : ' What is the cause of this sudden deter- mination of yours to visit Brighton ?' ♦ * Determination ?' repeated Henriette, who coloured quickly, as Blanche could detect in the mirror. ' Yes, cousin.' ' What other cause could I have but a wish to see the Appletons ?' 'But won't you see enough of them, as we go all out toge ther overland ?' ' Mrs. Applet on is so motherly — so kind.' ' Not more so than aunt Dormer, suiely ?' * Oh no, she could never be so.' p 2 212 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. * Come now, Henriette dear — yon cannot hoodwink me.' *I do not think of doing so/ repHed poor Henriette, blushing more deeply now. ' The truth is — if you will confess it — that this old country house has grown weary to you, intolerable, since the occurrence of a certain event.' * To what event do you refer ?' asked Henriette, while her short upper lip quivered and her face resumed its general paleness of complexion. ' Cannot you guess ?' ' Indeed I cannot.' * I mean the departure of Stapleton,' said Blanche, though this perhaps was not the reply she had at first intended, for she was in a mischievous mood to-night. ' What is Colonel Stapleton to me ?' asked Henriette, with an emotion of relief, yet with a haughty toss of her little head. 'A minute ago did I not express my satisfaction that he had gone ?' * That might only be a cloak,' laughed Blanche. THE COUSINS. 213 ^Cousin,' replied Henriette innocently, *I would conceal nothing from you.' * Had you never a fancy for Lancelot Eudkin — or he for you ?' All things considered, the question was perhaps a cruel one ; but, with all her good qualities, Blanche could at times be rather pitiless in her rivalries, even though the yearning heart of her addressed might be, for all she knew, torn by neglect and dis- appointment — and it was a large and tender heart which beat under the soft white bosom of her she spoke to now. ^ Oh, no,' said Henriette, turning fully round and displaying two lovely dimpled elbows, as she coiled away the last wreath of her hair and stuck in a long pin. ' What have you ever seen in me to make you think so?' ' Only an admission you nearly made on that day when we were gathering the rose- leaves.' * You labour under some very strange mis- apprehension or mistake.' ' And then there was that little tableau in the library window.' 214 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. ' I repeat that yon are quite mistaken, dear cousin,' said Henriette, now assuming the offensive ; * he is your admirer, and you know he is.' * Mine ?' exclaimed Blanche, laughing. ' Yes ; and if you are not engaged,- you ought to be.' ^ Ought to be ! what do you mean ?' Henriette made no reply, so Blanche smiled a saucy conscious smile, and immediately changed the subject. ' I wonder if Jacky Appleton's curate still adores even her shadow, as he used to do, at Brighton. It isn't much use his doing so, however. If my Plunger is there, I shall make you welcome to the reversion of him.' ' Thanks, Blanche. How can I appreciate your generosity ?' asked Henriette, who was too gentle to feel long annoyed, and was now laughing merrily. * By being civil to the poor fellow. Though he is an heir to an old baronetcy, I don't think I could endure him now.' * Why now, more especially ?' * I cannot say.' THE COUSINS. 215 * Is it love of change, or change of love ?' * Both perhaps ; and now, good-night. The carriage will be at the door for you betimes to morrow, uncle says, so once again, dear cousin, good-night;' and with a kiss on each cheek Blanche Bingham swept away to her own room, leaving Henriette, who was not fated to have much repose for that night. During the foregoing conversation she had checked with difficulty more than once an indignant feeling, that made large tears gather under her white eyelids, or a flush to cross her cheek. She felt instinctively that there had been something unkind in the tone and bearing of her volatile cousin, and Henriette regretted this, and strove to thrust the conviction aside ; for though she had plenty of proper spirit, she was gentle and soft-hearted by nature ; she sincerely loved her bright little cousin, and now they were about to be separated for a time. She did not complete her undressing ; but sat thoughtfully gazing into the changing embers of the fire long after Blanche had 216 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. deposited her tiny dog in a dainty mother-of- pearl basket lined with silk, laid her head on the laced pillow, and gone off into the land of pleasant dreams. ( 217 ) CHAPTER XVIII. A CATASTROPHE OCCURS. Meanwhile, all unconscious that I was the subject of such an interesting discussion between such rosy lips, I was lingering alone, over a havanna, in the billiard- room, trying a succession of hazardous strokes and cannons for mere practice, haunted the while by the strange and melancholy song Henriette had sung. I had been for some time left entirely to my own reflections ; the General had long been a-bed, as he kept what he called ' Indian hours,' and, to the great disgust of the butler and housemaids, was always up and abroad, or in every one's way, daily ^ by gun-fire.' In all my cogitations the idea of Henriette mingled strangely with that of Blanche, and I felt that which a writer has 218 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. described as * the indefinable instinct of something yet to come.' Her approaching departure brought the reahty of my own more vividly before me. It was pretty close at hand now, and by anticipation I felt all the cruel wrench' the separation from Blanche would be, and the blank in my life that must follow till I rejoined her in Calcutta. *A good stroke that,' thought I ap- provingly, as I pocketed the red ball ; * but I suppose when I am mated at Garden Eeach, when the Lord Bishop of Calcutta has uttered the necessary benediction, and Pater- familias has added "Bless you, my chil- dren !" much of this sort of thing will be at an end. No more backing the red, making books on the Calcutta Derby or the Sonepore Plate ; no more picnics for the ladies of the station, or champagne suppers in the mess- room ; no more flirtations at the band- stand, or hog- spearing, or tiger-potting, or betting on who'll pull the longest straw from the roof of the bungalow, or any other absurdity. Of course, I shall become tremendously domestic — begin to have an idea of the A CATASTROPHE OCCURS. 219 smartest things in bonnets and holland riding-habits — shall look after the ice-club, perhaps even the ayahs, mahogany-coloured, lean, and bony, in scarlet and yellow raiment — that is, if they have anything to wheel in perambulators under a sun- shade — peram- bulators, ye gods ! Farewell, a long farewell to all my — What the deuce is the matter ?' I exclaimed aloud, as my mental soliloquy was suddenly brought to an end by an alarming cry that came to my ear. * Fire ! fire ! The house is on fire !' It was the shrill voice of a woman evi- dently in great terror, so I rushed from the room. * The butler, or some one else, was now clanging at the deep and sonorous house- bell, which hung in a species of square turret above the centre of the mansion, an edifice rather quadrangular in design ; and the din of this at such an hour brought the scared inmates from their various rooms in hot haste, all more or less attired, as some — the female portion especially — had been a-bed. The lamp in the great central staircase, 220 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. which luckily was all of stone and massively built, was yet burning, and by its light I saw Blanche and Mrs. Poplin in their night- dresses, with shawls thrown hastily about them, rushing down in terror and bewilder- ment — the former bearing Tiny in his mother-of-pearl basket. ^ Lancelot, Lancelot, the rooms below ours are on fire !' said she, as she swept past me to seek her aunt. 'Thank heaven you are safe, dear Blanche!' I exclaimed in my excitement, heedless of who might detect our familiarity or want of ceremony. ' But Henriette — Henriette ! ' ' Where is she ?' I asked hurriedly. ' In her room — in her room still, sir !' screamed Poplin ; ' the door was locked, and I could not make her hear us.' I rushed up the stone staircase towards the corridor off which I knew that the sleeping rooms of the cousins opened. It was lined with ancient wainscot panelling and floored entirely with wood. The smoke was rolling from it in volumes as the fire from below reached it, and I could see the A CATASTROPHE OCCURS. 221 little jets of red flame already spirting up through the joints of the planking. At the extreme end of the corridor I could also see the figure of Henriette as she stood silent and terror-stricken at the door of her room, which she dared not leave, lest the floor of the passage should give way beneath her. She stretched her arms towards me imploringly in mute appeal — or if she spoke, the clang of the house-hell, the crackling of the flames as they spread fast in the wainscoted rooms below, and the mingled cries of alarm from the household, drowning what she said. Her retreat was cut off ! I could see no means of approaching her, save at the risk of falling into the flaming gulf below, as the crackling boards must fail to sustain my weight. My blood curdled. I had seen the corpse of a woman who had been scorched to death in a blazing hut at Yarna ; I remembered its loathsome aspect — the hair gone, the hands shrunk up like freakish knots, its contorted attitude, blackened, lean, shrivelled, horrible ! The 222 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. memory of it at that moment made me shudder, as I went plunging down the stair- case to the terrace outside to see if by any means I could reach the fatal room in which Miss Guise was now completely im- prisoned. Three of the lower rooms in that wing of the hall were now filled with fire and smoke, and zigzag rents were already apparent in the old brick- walls. The flames were just bursting from the windows ; the ancient lozenge-shaped panes quickly passed away, and the mullions, with their stone tracery, were defined in black outline against the red light within. From amid the ivy that clung to the old walls the twittering birds were scared in flocks by the flames and ge- neral uproar which had so suddenly startled the serenity of the autumn night. The carved stonework of the hall, its coats of arms, half shrouded among dark-green leaves, the gurgoyles along the roof or cornice, looking like griflins or chimeras grinning amid the smoke, and all its other architectural features, stood boldly out in the red and growing glare. As the wind got in, showers. A CATASTROPHE OCCURS, 223 of brands and sparks began to rain over all the terrace, and after a time, when the flame reached the roof, the molten lead began to drop through the open mouths of the gur- goyles just mentioned, rendering it perilous work to be near them. At the window of her room was Henriette Guise, wild with natural terror now. * Help me — save me ! Do not let me perish, dearest uncle ! Help me, Captain Eudkin ! I am too young to die — too wicked perhaps' (poor innocent Henriette). * Help me — help me !' Her cries and her situation made my heart thrill. I had no means of reaching her, and hence returned to the staircase again. Mrs. Dormer was lying there in a helpless swoon, and old Mrs. Jelipott, the housekeeper, on seeing her mistress thus, went off in the same fashion, but not so quietly, as she lay in her night-dress uttering a series of shrill screams at regular intervals, while beating a tattoo with her heels, quite unheeded by the scared domestics, male and female. General Dormer, whose heart had never 224 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. failed him, even at Chillianwallah, wrung his hands in the extremity of his misery. ' Aid me to save my girl if you can, Lance Kudkin,' he cried. ' I am old and stiff now, but with God's help we may — nay, we must — do something.' Silently I rushed up the great staircase again ; there was less smoke in the corridor ; but now the flames were shooting through an open gap in the wooden flooring close to where it joined the stone pavement of the landing-place. This flaming aperture, which separated me from Henriette's room, was, as yet, only some four or five feet broad. Kepeatedly I was driven back by the smoke, which was overpowering, until I placed a wetted handkerchief across my mouth ; then, aided by a tall and sturdy footman, I tore from its hinges a door to bridge over the gap, and thus passed it. The moment I did so more of the flooring fell in, and with it my temporary bridge ; more fiercely than ever the flames shot up, and my retreat, like that of her I sought to save, was also cut off; but I had reached her room, and she threw herself half- fainting A CATASTROPHE OCCURS. 225 on my arm as I shut the door to exckide the sparks and smoke. Not a moment was to be lost, and I turned to the still opened window, against which two ladders, brought from the stable -yard and lashed together, had been planted by the gardener and grooms. The window-sill was fully twenty-four feet from the ground; the descent would have been easy, but between us and escape there was an unthought-of barrier. The antique windows in this wing of the house were all muUioned, and the space between each of these shafts would not have permitted eveij a child to pass ! * AVe are lost ; and I have destroyed you !' said Henriette in a low gasping voice, as her head drooped on my shoulder, and she closed her eyes, while for a moment the memory of her melancholy song flashed upon me. Was it really ominous of evil, and to prove prophetic ? Lovely indeed did the girl look in her pale beauty and half disrobed for the night, just as she had fallen asleep near the fire amid her meditations, her black hair all dis- VOL. I. Q 226 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. lievelled and streaming in soft masses over her white shoulders. I felt, while gazing upon her, that some reparation from me was indeed owing. It seemed hard that she should perish so miserably, and almost in sight of Blanche too. At all hazards I had come to save her, and if I failed — though so happy in the success of my love — I could but die with her. I deposited Henriette in a chair, and looked wildly about for some means of escaping from the terrible trap in which we were so suddenly placed, and where we had scarcely a moment for delay or reflection, for death was close indeed ; the flames were already crackling in the room beneath, and the heat of them became awfully apparent ; but in such dilemmas instinct is often stronger than reason. Death was in the rear and no escape in front ! Were Henriette and I to die thus, and together, after all ? A death so fearful, too, and so suddenly brought upon us ! But half-an-hour ago all was so quiet and peace- ful — this catastrophe as unthought of as the deluge. A CATASTROPHE OCCURS. 227 In the vague hope of gaming the roof I looked to the ceiling, but it was too lofty to be reached, even had I the means of breaking through it. The room was wainscoted ; I sounded the panels on every side with a poker and found the solid wall everywhere. I struck at the mullions of the windows with the same implement till it bent and broke in two, and my arm tingled to the shoulder with the futile strokes. In the room there was a small settle, a kind of sofa, of oak, antique and richly carved. Seizing this, to use as a species of battering ram, I dashed it against the mui- lions of the window in fierce succession and with breathless haste. Despair and anxiety for her who was watching me with imploring eyes imbued me with a strength I was all unaware of possessing or being able to exert. At the third stroke I dashed out one of the mullions, thus beating two apertures into one. A burst of applause came from below, where some of the servants and labourers on the estate were gathered in an anxious and excited group. Grateful was the sensa- tion of the cool night wind as it blew on my Q 2 228 FAIREB THAN A FAIRY. flushed face when I passed ont upon the ladder, and Hfting Henriette after me, began slowly and carefully the difficult task of descending — difficult while thus laden. We, had barely left the window ere flp,mes shot through it, and a storm of sparks flew over us as the floor of the room fell in, and the fire from below burst up. Our peril had been greater even than I thought, and we had not escaped it a mo- ment too soon. ^ Saved, saved, and by you /' murmured Henriette, as she hung half fainting in my right arm while I steadied myself with my left hand, and fortunately for us both the girl's weight was light. * Bravo, captain ! Hooray !' cried the grooms and gardeners who stood beneath, their upturned faces shining in the ruddy glare. ' Hold the ladder steady, my men,' said I, feeling that the task I had yet to accomplish was somewhat arduous ; but in less than half a minute the ground was reached safely, and my charge consigned to the care of her uncle and Blanche. A CATASTROPHE OCCURS. 229 ^Now, my lads,' cried I, 'follow me with axes and fire -buckets ; let us do what we can to save the old house.' In a country district, and especially so excluded and remote as that occupied by Thorsgill Hall, fire-engines were not to be thought of, and had not the great stone staircase intervened to cut off the flames from the rest of the building, it must have perished, notwithstanding all our willing efforts with water in stable-buckets passed from hand to hand, and all our exertions in cutting down wooden partitions here and there. The ' ghost's wing' alone was destroyed by the catastrophe. Of course no one knew the origin of this fire, which might have ended so fatally, and also have destroyed the whole of the fine old ancestral mansion, which had been the home of the Dormers for many generations, so of course nobody was to blame. With a hearty adjective the jolly old General said he 'didn't care now that his Henriette was safe.' But there were some rumours of a knight of the shoulder-knot having been flirting with a 230 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. pretty housemaid — old Bagsliaw the keeper's daughter — and exchanging marks of their mutual esteem, till scared by the sudden and stealthy approach of the wary and rigid Mrs. Jelipott, and that hence a lighted candle had been hidden near some in- flammable material, and so forth. The cause was soon forgotten in the magnitude of the effect, and of the terrible risk run by Henriette, whom I had saved, but only to encounter greater perils elsewhere perhaps. Boundless was the gratitude of her uncle and aunt, and I felt assured of having, at least, their warmest consent to my engage- ment with Blanche, had I been permitted by her to reveal our mutual secret ; but dearer to me were the praises of her, and on this occasion she ventured to say more than she could otherwise have done. ' Oh, it was a terrible half-hour, Lance darling/ she whispered in my ear; 'but how heroic, how romantic too, was the rescue of poor dear Henriette !' ' Greater romances and more heroism ap- pear in the newspapers every day, Blanche,' said I. A CATASTROPHE OCCURS. 231 'But I hope she didn't kiss you in the midst of her gratitude/ * Why ?' I asked, laughing. ' Because I should be so jealous ! And as for your kisses, they are no longer your own/ ' Whose then ?' ' Can you ask me ? — mine, of course, every one,' and laughingly patting my cheek she hastened to rejoin her cousin. Once more the household — all save some grooms and labourers, who watched or worked in the ruined wing — subsided for the remainder of the night, or rather morning. Mrs. Dormer and Mrs. Jelipott had each a dose of sal volatile, and the General a jorum of ^ brandy-pawnee, for, man alive, but this affair was worse than Chillianwallah.' After my recent Crimean experiences, and such a devil of a hurly-burly and excitement, I was too much of a soldier to turn-in. I also took from the butler a stiff glass of brandy-and- water as a nightcap, and had my ^ forty winks ' on a sofa in the billiard- room, where I dozed and dreamt, not of her I loved, or of her I had saved, but, oddly enough, of the 232 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. cavalry charge at Bulganack, and the Sister of Charity who nursed me in the Tartar cottage — poor httle Louise Marie; and this association of ideas was caused by some sensations of pain in the old bullet- wound, the result of my exertions in beating-out the muUion of the window, or bearing Henriette down the ladder. By the events of the night all the house- hold at the hall were completely upset ; yet, to our great surprise, Henriette Guise was still resolute in her intention to leave us. ( 233 ) CHAPTEE XIX. henkiette's departure. Whatever may happen in a house — robbery, fire, or even death — people, being civiHsed, must as usual meet at breakfast, luncheon, and dinner; so we duly assembled at the first named repast when the gong clanged, anxious to compare our notes on the recent event, and looking all more or less worried and weary. The General certainly was the most lively of the party, though regretting the loss of a hookah given to him by the Rajah of Chutneypore, a pair of pistols presented by the Governor- General, and some other Indian impedimenta. Henriette had an aspect both haggard and wan; indeed, she was a few shades paler than was her wont, and answered me with difficulty when I made the usual well-bred 234 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. and expected, but nevertheless sincere and earnest, inquiries about her health. Her aunt entreated and the General or- dered her to remain at the Hall, as her nerves were evidently shaken by the dreadful fright she had undergone ; but no — no — she had promised to visit Mrs. Appleton, and v^as resolved to start that very day for Brighton, and no power could detain her. She was — for her — almost angrily energetic on this point. Her wardrobe had luckily escaped the destruction of everything else in her room, by having been, after it was packed, placed in the entrance-hall over- night. Breakfast done, the General had a con- sultation to hold with his steward concerning the late accident; Blanche had another to make with Mrs. Poplin about their mutual losses in the conflagration ; and I was left to smoke a solitary cigar in the library while idling over the morning papers. I was occupied thus when suddenly by my side I found Henriette Guise in her hat and otter- skin jacket, attired for her journey, and somewhat nervously striving to button an HENRIETTE'S DEPARTURE. 235 obstinate glove on lier slender and shapely hand. ' Allow me, Miss Guise,' said I, starting up; ' and so you are still resolved to desert us T ' Yes ; the carriage will be at the door in another minute, Captain Eudkin/ ' How much we shall all miss you !' * I am so glad to see you for a moment alone, Captain Eudkin, before I go.' * Why alone V I asked, struck by a nervous peculiarity in her manner, and retaining in mine the hand on which I had just buttoned the straw-coloured kid glove. * That I may once again thank you, buf coherently, for saving me as you did last night ; I must have perished else. Thank you, if I can, in words,' she added, with a tremulousness of voice which I naturally attributed to the terror she had undergone. * Thus I am glad to see you alone, as I said ; for Blanche — Blanche, as you are aware, makes so light of everything.' Her curved lip was quivering with emotion, for she was an affectionate and impulsive girl, and there were very unmistakable tears welling up in her beautiful dark eyes. 236 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. ' You are still nervous and highly excited — why go to-day ?' I urged. ' To-morrow will find you stronger and more composed. Surely I have earned some right to entreat ?' But she only smiled and shook her. head. As I gazed on her softly-featured face and in her eyes, the brightness of which was mellowed by the fringes of their long dark lashes, for a moment, but a moment only, something of former emotions came back to me with a force of which I was scarcely aware at the time, and of which Blanche might not have approved. But I was only a sincere friend now, and remembering that fact, Henriette looked down, and strove to become to all appearance cold, collected, and composed. She had a smart little hat with a single feather ; it was placed jauntily well over her forehead, and her veil was twisted round it. Her gloves fitted her hands to perfection ; and her toilette, so far as collar, cuffs, and studs went, was complete in its good taste. At each of her small and closely set ears there dangled a single pearl. The intense blackness of her soft silky hair, with her eye- HENBIETTKS DEPARTURE. 237 brows and eyelashes, as contrasted with the pale white purity of her complexion, struck me as very singular in their degree. It was a face that one never could forget. It seemed that her eyes looked brighter and her lips paler than I had ever seen them before. As we looked at each other for a few seconds in nervous silence, I felt the- convic- tion forced upon me that the girl had a greater regard for me than I could ever have flattered myself to have been the case. I read it in her eyes by an expression that is indescribable ; I saw it in her manner, and the idea filled me with perplexity. * Often,' as Scott says, * how easy it is for the tongue to betray what the heart would gladly con- ceal;' so thus, when Henriette spoke again, there was a chord — a little tremor — in her sweet voice that touched me deeply, not then perhaps so much as when I thought of it afterwards. Her little hand was placed upon my arm now, and I felt that, mechanically and unknown to herself, its grasp was tightening there : * To you I owe my life — my rescue from a 238 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. fate that is too terrible to contemplate. I have indeed no words wherewith to thank you, dear Captain Pudkin, but I shall never forget you, be assured of that/ I pressed her hand in silence, and she resumed with an effort, her eyes downcast the while : ' I know not what I may have said or admitted in my great terror, for all that passed last night seems like a hazy dream to me now, but — but think not the less of me. Captain Kudkin, if I did so.' * You said nothing. Miss Guise, nothing that I can remember,' I replied in all sin- cerity and with some surprise, for a fear was evidently haunting her that some secret of her heart had escaped her during her great dismay, and my assurance seemed to give her infinite relief. ' We have had a pleasant autumn visit here. Captain Eudkin, and had many happy days that may never come again ; but there is the carriage at the door, and now good- bye — good-bye for ever, too probably!' ' Do not say for ever ; we shall meet again, I trust.' HENRIETTE'S DEPARTURE. 239 I stooped, and was in the act of kissing her gloved hand, when the playful voice of Blanche said : * Are you actually about to part so coldly and frigidly with a mere shake of the hand ?' Urged thus I obeyed the hint, and touched the pale cheek of Henriette with my lips. In a moment more she had rushed down- stairs. I felt that, under all the circumstances, the playful and impulsive Blanche should not have urged me — supposed to be a mere friend — to salute her cousin thus ; but follow- ing her down the perron, I led her to the carriage, into which she sprang lightly and in haste, as if it was a place for conceal- ment. A tall footman closed the door, the General waved his hand from the window, I lifted my hat, and she was gone. From an oriel of the drawing-room Blanche was blowing kisses after the carriage as it bowled down the avenue, and I proceeded to join her. I now saw that I had been rendered utterly oblivious of the many indescribable and un- teachable signs by which a man learns 240 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. that a woman loves him, and so careless of that which once I would have perilled all to win, I had grown pleased — heavens ! pleased — to think that Henriette was going away. Servants are more acute observers than we give them credit for being. ^ Poor thing,' I heard Mrs. Poplin say to Mrs. Jelipott, as I passed through the softly- carpeted hall, ' she is just breaking her 'art about that conceited Captain Eudkin, when she might have had that 'andsome Colonel Stapleton, who seemed so fond of her.' ' And couldnH the Captain see it ?' ' No, not he !' ' Why, Poplin T ' Why ? Bless you, ma'am, he sees nothing in this world but Miss Blanche and her golden 'air ; and talking of her makes me think that young ladies can do many a thing that a poor servant daren't do.' Were these gossips indeed right ? I did not wish to think so, and so hurried up-stairs lest I should hear more. If all this were, really the case, whence came the decisive nature of the reply to her cousin, which I HENRIETTE'S DEPARTURE. 241 had so accidentally overheard — the firm words ' certainly not'? I was sorely puzzled altogether. ' We wonder if any man that walks the earth is worthy of the whole devotion of a woman's heart ?' questions the author of General Bounce; and some such surmise flashed through my mind as I thought over all the past night and morning. It filled me with pity and friendship for Henriette ; for I must have been something more or something less than man if much that was mysterious in the girl's manner and face had not deeply impressed and affected me. But this was for a little time only ; Blanche soon obliterated it. And when her cousin was swept away from us down the long and stately avenue that led towards the little railway station at Winston, the little church and parsonage of which, from the summit of a wooded hill, look down upon the Tees — swept away, I say, in the Dormers' stately coach, with its gay hammercloth and florid panels, charged with the demi-lion and ten billets, azure and or, its portly white-wigged coachman, its VOL. I. R 242 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY, powdered valet and high- stepping bays — I never knew till long, long after how bitter were the tears the girl shed behind her veil in a corner of it, and which the old General, who accompanied her, thought were the natural result of grief for her departure. ( 243 ) CHAPTEE XX. * CALL ME YOUR LITTLE WIFE.' Blanche and I were left for one more week together ; but the day of parting came soon — too soon, indeed — a day the memory of which was fated to haunt me long, even amid wild and stirring scenes ; and in a fortnight from that time she was to sail from Southampton with the Appletons, on her departure for India, thus anticipating mine by several weeks. At noon, by a secret arrangement, we met in the garden at a time when none were likely to miss us. Aunt Dormer was closeted with Mrs. Jelipott, on household matters intent ; the General was busy with Bagshaw the keeper and Mr. Tim Snaffel, a little lean old huntsman, with a long body and bandy legs, about the dosing of some favourite harriers, with syrup of buckthorn and vege- R 2 244 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. table broth, for a breaking-out somewhere ; so he was also, luckily for us, out of the way. How well I can recall the place and time, even in minor details, of this last meeting — a meeting of which the brilliant goldfinch twittering in an old pear-tree, the woodcock and the deer in their lair among the fern, were the only witnesses ; a parting all the more tender that our final one would of necessity be formal and cold, as far as acting went, in the presence of others. The tints of autumn had deepened in the shady avenue and far- spreading chase ; in the garden, the gaudy dahlias that bordered the walks had been already marred in beauty by the frost of early morning, in the last chill hour before the dawn, the crisped leaves lay thick under the bared hedgerows, and the whole aspect of Nature enhanced the sadness of our last meeting and parting ; and we could but thank Heaven that we were both leaving pleasant Thorsgill about the same time, and hence that one would not be long compelled to lament, amid the same scenes, the absence of the other. I was first at our trysting-place, and on 'CALL ME YOUR LITTLE WIFE: 245 seeing Blanche approach I hastened to meet her ; but there was Httle need of that, for in a moment her soft arms were round my neck, and her face — fair as a dream of Eden — was nestled on my breast, and I led her into an arbour. The dialogue of parting lovers is usually somewhat hackneyed ; yet in the words and ways of Blanche Bingham there were some little mannerisms peculiarly her own. 'Oh, this is indeed love!' she murmured, as she laid her head on my breast ; * this is indeed love at last,' she added lower. * I have flirted with many, had my fancies too, perhaps, but I never thought to love any man as I do you. Lance.' ' So it is with me, darling,' said I, while playing dreamily with her marvellous hair ; * the love of you fills up every illusion of the heart, which we are told may find many a resting-place, but only once a home.' ^ I wonder if all lovers think the same as we do,' said she, after a pause. * Doubtless, Blanche ; yet how strange it seems that we, who are all in all to each other now, but a few weeks ago knew not of 246 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. each other's existence ! Fate has thrown us together, and Fate must not separate us.' * While hving, Lance darhng ; but there is our journey to India — that long, long journey to be performed apart, separate — and' I love you so,' she sobbed. ' Oh, that papa were here ! Could not uncle Dormer — but no, no, it is not to be thought of! We must be patient, and w^ait — wait — and I shall ever think of you as my lover-husband; so call me your little wife. Lance,' she whispered, with an engaging caress. ' You are indeed my dearest little wife !' I rejoined, in the same breathless voice. Blanche could — to use a common phrase — turn the old General round her pretty fingers, as indeed she did every one else at the Hall ; yet she shrank nervously from intrusting him with our secret. * You must never hint of engagement in your letters here,' she said, with her bright hazel eyes full of tears for me to kiss away ; ' nor must you write to papa about it, or to cousin Henriette — ' * She would be the last person — ' I began. * Or to any one else till you can see dear 'CALL ME YOUR LITTLE WIFE: 247 mamma at Calcutta, and bring her round, as I know you will, to listen favourably to you, to us both ; and I shall write you often, as often as I can, from Southampton, from Marseilles and the Point de Galle ; but of you, darling — ' ' Of me you can only hear at long uncer- tain intervals, and through others.' And so, with aching hearts, we made our little arrangements for the sad interval of our separation. The birds continued to twitter around us ; the faded leaves drifted away on the wind ; the shadows began to fall eastward ; buf we still sat there, often in dreamy silence, a silence more eloquent than words could be, the silence of two souls joined in one, entranced, forgetful of the passing time and of all but ourselves. To me there seemed to be but one woman in the world now, one heart worth living for — the heart that was pressed to me, and which appeared to throb for me alone. ' It is so strange,' exclaims a brilliant writer; * we see a million of faces, we hear a million of voices, we meet a million of women with 248 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. flowers in their breasts and light in their eyes, and they do not touch us. Then we see one, and she holds us for life and death, and plays with us idly often — idly as a child with a toy. She is not nobler, better, or- more beautiful than were all those we passed, and yet the world is empty to us without her.' But why dwell longer on all this ? We were soon brought back to this practical and work- aday world by Mr. Vintage, the butler, who after having set some bottles of the General's most favourite and particular claret to air before the fire in honour of my departure, thundered the warning gong for dinner on the terrace. We started at the odious sound. Again her dear arms went round my neck, and our lips met for the last time in a long, long kiss. Those who saw us quietly and decorously seated at the last meal we were to take to- gether — the tall footmen with their silver entree dishes, and old Vintage in his ampli- tude of white vest and black coat, with his peculiar claret and moselle — could little imaojine the recent scene in the arbour, or 'CALL ME YOUR LITTLE WTFE: 249 the emotions that were welling-np in our hearts, while the great epergne, with all its flowers, towered between us. At last the fatal hour came, and I saw the fair face of Blanche grow very pale as the sound of the carriage wheels and of the horses' hoofs rasped on the ground before the entrance to the Hall ; and then Mr. Vintage, announcing that my baggage was in the rumble, stood respectfully with the door open to bow me out. The General shook my hand warmly; Mrs. Dormer kissed me twice, as a mother might do ; Blanche's hand I only took lingeringly- in mine, and kissed it, to all appearance, as frigidly as Sir Charles Grandison would have done, and in another moment we were apart — the little face, with its tresses of mar- vellous hair and soft eyes of golden hazel, had gone from me, perhaps for ever. We shall see. As the easily-hung carriage went rolling down the avenue, the scene of many a happy ramble, the evening seemed somehow to grow suddenly darker to my fancy. In thinking over the past it appeared to me full of 250 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. omissions. I counted over a thousand things I ought to have said, a thousand caresses I might have given ; yet the time we were together seemed pretty well filled up in both ways ; but the imagination of love is ever active, and often self-torment- ing. How was I to kill the time that must intervene between this evening and the day of embarkation ? What if I should be ordered to remain with the depot, instead of going to India ? But that idea was too intolerable to be entertained. What was I to say in the first letter I could write to her with safety ? In what terms would I break our tender secret to Mrs. Bingham at Garden Eeach ; and what manner of woman was she — gentle and kind, or haughty and cold ? It seemed impossible that the mother of my bright, merry Blanche could be either of the last ; and then there must be papa Bingham to en- counter. All these points and many more I thought of while the monotonous train, 'with its drowsy hum,' bore me on; now pausing at 'CALL ME YOUR LITTLE WIFE: 251 stately York, with its castle and minster towering high in air ; now at Peterborough, with its cathedral and lonely castle mound ; past stations filled with glittering lights and bustle ; anon roaring through dark tunnels, or darting out of their gloom into the radiance of the moon, when fields and hedge- rows, paddocks of rich grass-land or freshly- ploughed fallow, wayside streams and pools of shining water, seemed all flying past in circles on either side. Queen Mab was not with me that night ; and from a short sleep I was roused to find I was quietly gliding into the great station at King's Cross. Once more I was in Babylon. It was but a few hours ago that I had been seated with Blanche in the arbour ; and already a con- fused infinity of time seemed to have elapsed since we parted. 252 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. CHAPTEE XXL TILBURY FORT. Back again to old Tilbury, opposite Graves- end — or Knavesend, as a traveller once suggested it should be called. I had bid farewell to ' mufti' ; no more leave now, nor did I care to have it till in ' the Land of the Sun,' as she once named it. All the world knows Tilbury, with its two relics, which are, or used to be, kept in the canteen — Queen Bess's chair and De Euy- ter's cannon-ball ; the chair in which she rested and imbibed a tankard of home-brewed after haranguing her troops in the adjacent camp ; and the rusty six-pound shot fired from the Dutch admiral's ship when the colours of their high mightinesses struck terror along the shores of the Medway, while worthy Mr. Pepys was imploring our seamen TILBURY fort: 253 to fight, and King Charles was flirting with the maids of honour at Whitehall. Though flat and gloomy, it is a quaint place, old Tilbury ; but the present regular fortification was only engrafted by Sir Martin Beck, engineer to Charles II., on the old block- house of bluff Harry's time, after it had been burnt by the Dutch. The bastions are faced with brick, and have a moafc and double ditch ; and within them is the spacious barrack-yard, where many a time and oft I have ' handled ' a musketry squad, and for many a tiresome hour taught aiming drill at black spots painted on the barrack wall. My chief chum, Joe Lonsdale of ours, had gone on leave of absence, which my rejoining had enabled him to obtain ; thus, being in sole command of a depot nearly two hundred strong, left me little leisure time on my hands. I was back to military duty once again ; but how changed in some respects seemed all professional interests for a time to me ! Amid the monotony of life in Tilbury Fort — for it is a monotonous, gloomy, and Dutch-looking 254 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. place — how I longed to see again that fairy- face, and hear the tones of that' playful voice which memory brought so distinctly to my ear, assuring me — as her letters did — that she loved me still ! Dreamer that I was ! For a regular lover is a man of one thought only, and hence for a time is somewhat akin to a fool in the estimation of many. Our orders from the Commandant at Chatham were to get all the new recruits for' India ^ licked into shape,' as the phrase is, without delay ; and while daily I worked hard with a musketry squad, my mind was ever elsewhere — ever sighing over the happy past while nervously fearful of the future ; for if her family declined to permit her to share a captain's bungalow, the time to come might prove gloomy enough for us both. Jewellery of all kinds — bracelets, necklets, rings, and those thousand pretty trifles now framed by taste and invention for pleasing women and luring men's money away — I longed to send, even to the dilapidation of my Indian outfit ; but situated as we were, it was impossible to have done so without ex- citing comment at Thorsgill Hall, and letting ! TILBURY FORT. 255 in an unnecessary light upon our secret relations. These mementos, however, I con- soled myself by forwarding to Southampton. How happily, in my day-dreams, I re- hearsed all that had passed between us on that eventful evening at Stoke Priory, and our tender parting in the arbour ! In imagination I seemed to see her again and again, to feel her little hand steal softly into mine, with the tender kisses of the time that was, alas, no more ; and often in the night, when I might have enjoyed the jovial society of my comrades, or a sound sleep after a hard day's drill, I have mused and pondered till the morning drums beat reveille in the echoing barrack-yard, announcing, as it seemed, that I had yet before me another day of separation from Blanche Bingham. That on which she was to sail from South- ampton arrived, and I had flattered myself that I might procure one day's leave to see her depart ; but by the dictum of inexorable Fate I found myself in orders for a garrison court-martial, and so could but write an answer to her last letter, dated from the hotel of Mrs. Appleton, under whose wing, 256 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. as cliaperone, she and Henriette Guise were together now. I had previously sent her many presents of books, music, and other unostentatious trifles to the Hall, and the receipt of these she acknowledged by letters, which in tenor were all that I could have wished. Love missives are usually voted stupid, save by those who are most interested in them ; yet with what avidity do we find these additions to the literature of the country devoured when they are ' aired ' by some special pleader in the Divorce Court or a breach-of-promise case, and when all the pretty nothings, so pleasing to those who recognise the pet phrases, are held up to coarse ridicule or empty laughter ! Little did the worthy bugle -major who acted as postman at the Fort know how my heart quickened at his approach, and how both heart and eye dwelt on every word of the dear letters he brought me. Apart from all love, it is always pleasing to receive a girl's letter ; for even mild * Dear sir,' traced by her pretty penmanship, seems so different from the same prefix to * amount of account TILBURY FORT, 257 rendered,' from some cold-blooded limb of law — a legal Shylock waiting for his pound of flesh. Though the last I should receive in England, most welcome was her letter to me, as water to one who was athirst in the desert, or rain to the flowers drooping and the grass-blades withering in the sun of an arid season ; but there were two paragraphs in it which gave me occasion for a little thought. * Colonel Stapleton paid us a farewell visit. He is looking exceedingly well, but Jacky Appleton (who has thrown over her mild curate) thinks his long moustaches will be a greater source of amusement to him than of terror to an enemy/ {' Stapleton coming to the front again,' thought I.) ' I can see you in fancy, my dearest Lance, in that dull barrack-room, which you have so often described to me at Thorsgill ; and all the love of my heart seems to go with this to you ! Oh, need I say how I miss the days and hours we spent at dear old uncle Dormer's ? Yes, yes ; separation is indeed, VOL. I. s 258 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. as your last delightful letter said, a living death. If I could but lay my poor little head on your breast as in the happy past times ! But consider my departure from Southampton as only the beginning- of our joyous ending. ^ And only think, darling, how delightful ! My quondam admirer, our Brighton friend, the Plunger, is actually going out with our party overland. He has succeeded to his baronetcy, and is now Sir Harry Calvert, of Something Hall, somewhere. He is to be an extra aide-de-camp on the staff of the Governor- General, I believe, but am uncer- tain. One thing I am sure of ; he is rather disposed to be troublesome ' (^ The devil he is !' was my comment) ' and attentive ; but you know, dearest, that I loathe all mankind save you.' She concluded by promising to write to me from every point at which the steamer touched in the Mediterranean and Eed Sea ; and placing her letter next my heart, I buckled on my sword, and went to the court-martial in a mood of mind that proved very beneficial to the prisoner we had to try, a certain TILBURY FORT. 259 obstreperous Dan O'Eegan of ours, who, when tipsy, had been defying to mortal combat, and threatening * to desthroy,' the sentinel at the Water-gate, when * confined to barracks.' Now I knew she was on the high seas, and fairly en route for her luxurious home at Garden Eeach ; so I turned resolutely to the inevitable, and became more reconciled to the many duties I had to perform. Blanche and Henriette were gone ; but I had not heard the last of Stapleton, a person- aoje of whose insouciance I have more than once complained. About this time I received a letter from my brother officer, Joe Lonsdale of ours, one of those handsome and pleasant fellows that all married women like and spinsters doat upon. He was enjoying his freedom in London, and now he pressed me to ' leave Tilbury on the wild shores of Essex, and come to town, were it only for a single night !' Among other temptations held forth by Joe was * a glorious ballet at the Theatre.' (* I have cut all that sort of thing now, my boy,' thought I.) * The manager is, or was, s 2 260 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. backed by Calvert of the Guards, who wished hun to engage permanently a certain dan- seuse, and he has given me his box, as he is gone to India. (Calvert ? this was no doubt Blanche's quondam admirer.) ' In the refreshment-room there is a most popular barmaid, to whom I shall introduce you, and whom, when she looks nice, I chuck under the chin. *'It isn't immorality, but only habit," as a writer says ; but do come up. were it only for a day, Kudkin. ' I met Stapleton at Hounslow Barracks, where Yignolles had been giving a squad of jolly girls four o'clock tea in his quarters, with the adjutant's wife and her inferior half (as she not inaptly named that gallant officer) to play propriety for the occasion. We all went to a ball somewhere after, and such fun we had. Lance ! I proposed to two of them, and I hope our letters of readiness will soon come, for I am in a deuced scrape. Perhaps you will act the irate parent and telegraph for me ; but were I cousin to the tom-cat at the Horse Guards, I would use his interest to effect an exchange, as I don't want to go to India at all.' (Poor TILBURY FORT. 261 Joe little foresaw what was before him there !) * Next day I dined with Stapleton at the Kag. It was his farewell feed, as he goes out with the first Indian drafts in the Jumna, so we shall soon follow. Some pleasant fellows were present — Vignolles of the Hussars ; Hicks of the 19th, who got as tight as a drum ; Jones of the 43rd, and others. * The Colonel, though a model of pro- priety, got slightly *' screwed," to say the least of it. He told us — when he became communicative — of his visit to '* old Chillian- • wallah,'' as he named General Dormer, and of a flirtation he had with a girl at his place — a lovely girl with golden hair, whose minia- ture he showed us. Do you know her ? He said she was like the heroine of a certain novel, of whom it was owned that *' all she did, even that which seemed almost childish, was done with that unspeakable grace which makes trifles charming.'" I put down Joe's letter. ' Golden hair' ? Could it be that Stapleton had possessed himself surreptitiously of that which even I had not — a likeness of my intended ? 262 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. ' Can the fellow be such a beastly snob as to hint such a thing ?' I exclaimed. The description of her manner was alarm- ingly like that of Blanche; yet it might apply to a thousand girls. It is impossible not to admit that this passage in Joe Lonsdale's letter about Stapleton annoyed me, and for many hours of the night I lingered over a cigar, making theories and building up many improbable fancies ; and finally came to the conclusion that on such rambling statements as these it might be rash to start for town, or Chatham, or wherever the Colonel was, and ^ collar ' him concerning a miniature to which he had not given a name, and might prove to be only that of some dancing-girl, to be had for a shilling or two at the nearest stationer's ; and still less did I think of the whole affair when I got her first letter, posted at Gibraltar, full of those endearing little phrases which were so characteristic of her manner, so playful, or, as the French would term it, caressante et foldtre. In a fortnight from that date she expected to be at Aden, and nearly half the world would be between us then. TILBURY FORT. 263 * Oh, that I had the magic carpet of the Arabian story, that I might come to you at will, darling Lance; or the enchanted tele- scope of the fairy tale, that I might see you !' she concluded. ' How much do time and distance destroy our happiness ; those *^ grim giants " that beset human life, and to whom all its annoyances are due !' I was proud of my regiment — as what soldier is not ? All the Line are Light Infantry or Kiflemen now ; but ive were the first, the original and genuine article ! Though now named the Prince Consort's Own Eifle Brigade, consisting of three bat- talions, we were originally the old 95th Kegiment, raised on the 25th of August, 1800, by General Coote Manningham, who was succeeded nine years after, as colonel, by Sir David Dundas, author of the then famous Eighteen Manoeuvres ; and in subsequent years the corps saw all the hard service of the war so gallantly waged between Britain and France, and it has fought in every part of the world, from the bombardment of Copen- hagen and the disaster at Monte Video down to Inkerman and the fall of Sebastopol. We 264 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. had now twenty-one great battles enumerated among our honours, and more were yet to be won in India. After her letter from Gibraltar, I looked in vain for another from Blanche ; but none came to me ; and her unkind silence was unaccountable. From each place where the P. and 0. liner touched she had written regularly to her aunt Dormer, as the good-natured General duly informed me ; I was thus au fait, to a certain extent, concerning her movements ; thus illness had not prevented her writing to me. Fickleness — that horrid idea never oc- curred to me. Could her subsequent letters to Tilbury have miscarried ? Had Mrs. Appleton discovered the correspondence through some indiscretion of Blanche, or by some gossiping communications made to her own girls, and in virtue of her position as chaperone interfered with her epistles, or forbidden them until she duly handed over her charge at Garden Eeach ? This seemed the most probable idea ; and as the drowning will cling to straws, I hastened to adopt it. Then I strove to TILBURY FORT. 265 console myself with the hope that when she reached home, and was free from Mrs. Appleton's control, she would have ample facilities for writing to me, though I could have none for replying. But a time came when a letter from Calcutta must have reached me had it been written ; but none ever came, and a horrible perplexity began to seize and haunt me. In the first agony of my suspense I was on the point of writing on the subject to Mrs. Dormer or the General, but remember- ing the wishes and injunctions of Blanche, I thrust aside the idea ; yet my heart went fondly back to the dear old Hall, with all its oriels, ivy, and clustering roses, amid which I knew the birds were nestling and twittering in the sunshine. I felt now that I had no object in life but to get away from Tilbury, and counted the days that must intervene before our trans- port, the Punniar, came to anchor in the river. Three months had now elapsed since I had last heard of Blanche, save through the family at Thorsgill Hall ; and still between 266 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. me and my men on parade, between me and my daily avocations, between me and my wits, there seemed to float a fairy-like figure, with golden hazel eyes, masses of sunny hair, and a face with a sweet waggish smile, -that told of the happy time at Thorsgill, when everything in Nature and in all our sur- roundings seemed but as so many links in the chain of love that bound us together. Alone in my gloomy barrack-room — and feeling at times most terribly alone — I con- ned and dreamed over all the sweet past, or revelled in the anticipation of the future that was to come. I thought with tenderness over all my sunny fairy's pretty ways and little sayings — her thorough individuality — and recalled all the dear old pet-phrases that were to be uttered again. India ! The mighty sea was to be tra- versed, all Africa to be gone round, and the Bay of Bengal to be ploughed by the Punniar, before we should be reunited. It seemed intolerable — incredible. Yet this cold and wearisome delay had to be borne ! With all this canker in my heart, I had, fortunately, the routine of military life to go TILBURY FORT. 267 through : there were drills and parades to undergo ; guards and pickets to command ; * officer for the day ' to see the men's bread and beef weighed out at seven a.m. ; rooms to inspect, prisoners to visit ; tattoo reports to collect, day reports to write, and all the petty business of the soldier's workaday world in time of peace to do. At last jolly Joe Lonsdale rejoined from London, and aided me with a will in the occupation of getting through the time. We had always billiards after mess. Dancing I eschewed, much to the surprise of seveml ' bits of muslin,' as Joe called them, who had been specially wont to look for me on such occasions. So the nights were, as I have said, devoted to pool and pyramid, varied with a little hazard, devilled bones, and champagne ; and I have often, I am sorry to say, passed in through the old Elizabethan gate of Tilbury with a light pocket and a lighter head, seeing two sentries where the corporal of the guard had posted only one, and when the ' Queen's morning drums ' were beating in the barrack-square. 268 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY, HAPTEK XXIL THE PUNNIAR. Thorsgill Hall, I have said, was a childless home, as all the little ones of General Dormer had found their graves at various stations up-country; all save one, Jack Dormer, who had grown to manhood, and was now one of the smartest lieutenants in our Eifle Brigade. Jack, I knew, was quartered at Dumdum, and consequently could have informed me of his cousin's movements had I written to him and frankly sought his confidence ; but the idea of doing so occurred too late, as the ' route ' for India arrived unexpectedly upon us, and the Punniar came to anchor off Tilbury, to receive on board twenty officers and four hundred men from that fort and from Chatham, for various corps in Bengal — two hundred being for the Rifle Brigade alone — with women, according to the then THE PUNNIAR. 269 existing regulations, in proportion of twelve to one hundred rank and file. We had to complete the Indian outfits for ourselves and our men in hot haste, and the day of embarkation came, before which we had to leave our P.P.C. cards for all our friends and the staflf. For these enigmatical letters, Joe Lonsdale, a habitual joker, sub- stituted D.I.O., signifying, * Damme, I'm off/ It was a gloomy February morning when the bugle sounded the ' assembly.' The hour was six, and the sun was yet far below the horizon ; a grey mist hung heavily over the river, shrouding the shores of Kent and Essex ; and the leafless trees, the brick bastions, the grass-embankments, and the guns in the embrasures, like everything else, were dripping with moisture. Grave send — famous in those days for its asparagus and its rascally watermen — was completely hidden from view ; but we heard the drums waking the echoes of its streets, half silent and empty at that early hour, as the detachments from Chatham came cheer- ing and marching down to the place of 270 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. embarkation for a ship of which the loose topsails, with blue peter at the foremast head, alone were visible above the haze. The barrack windows in Tilbury were crowded with soldiers in their shirt- sleeves, cheering our fellows as they fell in under the eye of the Fort Adjutant. All were in heavy marching order, with greatcoats and kettles strapped to their knapsacks. On the dark- green Rifle uniform of a few their Turkish and Crimean medals showed to great advan- tage ; and we had a crop of others yet to win in the sunny land for which we were departing. Save a few who had wives and little ones to leave behind them, all were heedlessly merry, and not a few were half tipsy ; but on an occasion of this kind — with young soldiers especially — discipline is always some- what relaxed till they are all safe on board ship, after which of necessity the reins are pulled tight together. Despite the oppressive gloom of the morning, I felt in the highest possible spirits. When again we trod dry land, Blanche, I thought, could not be far from THE PUNNIAB. 271 me ; and already in fond anticipation I saw the Punniar steaming up the waters of the Hooghly. Amid the busy whirl about me my heart was full of thoughts — thoughts of her ; ^ but let the heart watch — sad sentinel, weary of its post!' Military embarkations in time of peace are all pretty much alike ; the soldiers and their tearful wives, or sweethearts, all looking somewhat pale in the early morning, and, as I have said, a few tipsy — ' overwhelmed,' as Lonsdale phrased it, ' by strong beer and violent blubbering ' — the music of the band, half drowned by noisy cheers while playing ' The girl I left behind me,' varied by * Good- bye, sweetheart, good-bye.' As we had only a short march through the "Water Gate in the centre of the curtain-wall to the side of the river, we were without music, and my detachment went off to the ship in two large boats, which were pulled by fatigue parties of their comrades. One band as it marched through Gravesend played ' Love not.' As the cadence, brought by the morning wind across the rippling 272 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. river, fell upon my ear, it stirred rather a sad emotion in my heart for a little time, as I saw in memory Blanche Bingham seated at the piano in Thorsgill, when she sang that very song with such piquancy and 'point in her manner, her handsome head thrown back, her seducing eyes fixed on me, and the coils of her hair gleaming in the waxen lights ; and most unpleasantly there mingled with this reminiscence a consciousness of the ominous silence that had ensued — the curtain that seemed to have fallen between my love and me. The troops, with all their baggage and sea necessaries packed and cased, were all on board at last; the capstan was manned by soldiers and seamen, who tramped merrily round with the bars, beating time with their feet as they hove short on the anchor ; while with their farewell cheers, to which we responded, the boats' crews that had brought us off shot away into the rising mist shore- ward to each side of the river. As a rule, soldiers don't reflect much, and it is fortunate for them that they are so constituted. When the colours are uncased THE PUNNIAR. 273 and flying, when the cartridges are cast loose in the pouches, when the line of skirmishers is thrown out, and the cavalry and flying artillery go thundering to the front, when every face is flushed and every eye lit up, when we * stiffen the sinews and summon up the blood,' would it do to consider the sombre crape that was to be worn, the tears that were to be shed, and the darkness of death that ere long must fall on many a happy home ? * Not a lady going out with us, married or single,* said Joe Lonsdale. * I have been q,11 over the main- deck, through the cuddy, and everywhere — not a vestige of a petticoat to be seen.* * Better without them at sea, are we not ?' growled a crusty-looking old Major of the Line, who was in command of us all. ' What do you want with them ?* Joe eyed him half superciliously and sang : < << When we're far from the lips of those that we love, We make love to the lips that are near." A good regimental maxim. Major ; a way we usually have in the army.* VOL. I. T 274 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY, ' Not unknown in the navy too, I suspect/ added the Captain of the transport, with a knowing wink. ' Think you and I met at Sandhurst,' said a tall officer of Lancers to me. * Ten years ago ?' * Exactly. You remember me — Home of the 9th ?' * Perfectly; we were then going through that course of careful training — ' ' Which seems necessary to make a young fellow fit food for the demon of war,' inter- rupted Lonsdale ; ' a victim of the villanous saltpetre. Have a weed, old fellow ?' * Thanks ! I have been twice in India, Eudkin, since those days when we studied Straith together, with gunnery, *^ and how to scale a fortress or a nunnery," as Byron has it.' A summons to breakfast in the cuddy cut short the banter that was beginning on the poop, and ere that welcome meal was over, the screw of the Punniar was lashing the muddy current of the Thames to foam, as she cleft her way down the river ; and ere long Sheerness, with its docks and hulks, THE PUNNIAH. 275 and the low flat Isle of Sheppy, with its pastures and oozy marshes, were all on our starboard beam. A little time more, and the increasing roll of the great Indian steamer announced that we were beyond the Nore light, and that the pilot in charge, beside the men at the wheel, was keeping a sharp eye upon those long nar- row sandbanks which lie in parallel ranges in the estuary of the stately Thames. He left us at Deal, and then our last link with the shore — with dear old England — was broken. Ere this the Major commanding had issued his final orders for the voyage, according to H.M. Regulations. We — the officers of each detachment — had to see that our men were experienced in the mode of tying, untying, and stretching their hammocks, and that their bedding, knap- sacks, accoutrements, etc. were all disposed in the places allotted to them ; that their sea necessaries were served out and their liavre- sacks numbered. A guard under an officer was mounted, as we had more than three subalterns on board, and a captain of the day was in orders. T 2 276 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. The troops were divided into watches, Hke the ship's company ; but for deck duty only. It was a fine afternoon when we took our last farewell of the rugged Start on the coast of Devonshire. In the red sunset this bold ridge, which slopes abruptly into the sea, crowned in its entire length by splintered crags, worn and torn by the Atlantic storms, and all shaggy with moss, looked quaintly grim and stern. During the first few weeks of our outward voyage we had incessant squalls and rain. The latter served one good pur- pose, in addition to the steam hose and swabbing ; it thoroughly cleansed the ship's deck, her guns, bulwarks, and lower rigging, from a great quantity of iron rust that per- vaded everything, in consequence of a vast quantity of old shot, shell, and bar-iron having been put on board at Woolwich to serve as ballast. In crossing the Line the etiquette neces- sarily observed on board of a transport repressed much of the rough folly in which Jack is, or rather was, wont to indulge in honour of Neptune and his queen ; but as we approached the Cape, we had alternate THE PUNNIAR. 277 storms and calms, and during one of the latter I shot more than one enormous alba- tross with my short rifle. Whether it was to avenge Hhe bird of fear,' I do not pretend to say ; but next day, about the same time, when I had been dis- playing my accuracy of aim, and just as the strange flat Table Mountain, with its summit veiled in mist, begun to rise upon our port- bow, a sudden squall struck the Punniar, and carried away the foremast, with the maintop - mast, of course, and the flying jib-boom, while we were nearly swamped by the weather-roll. One large boat was blown fairly off the booms, and never recovered, and one of our engines was in some way injured by the terrible concussion. These sudden disasters necessitated our running into Cape Town to refit, and caused an unexpected delay of many, many weeks, during which I chafed sorely, amid the hearty satisfaction with which my brother officers betook them to shore-life and sport- ing with their double -barrels among the innumerable wild animals with which the region abounds, and I remember that among 278 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. these Lonsdale brought down by a single shot a beautiful khoo, or African buffalo, in a kloof of the mountains, and Home of the Lancers was equally successful in potting a bos cafer, with its gigantic horns. Once again, however, we were at sea, and drank ^ Sweethearts and wives,' on a Saturday night, just as the Lion's Head melted into the deep and the land of the Hottentots was left behind us. The tedium of our voyage was varied by parades when the weather permitted, rigging wind sails to ventilate the orlop deck, such sails being always in charge of the sergeant of the watch, getting the hammocks up for stowage in the nettings, seeing the men messed, and so forth. Salt-water is said to be an admirable specific against the tender passion ; but on this occasion I did not find it so. I have known men boast that their hearts grew lighter with change of scene, which is natural enough, and paradoxically lighter still as the distance increased between them and some beloved object ; but the latter was never the case with me. THE PUNNIAE, 279 My friend Lonsdale was the king of good fellows, and perhaps my groomsman to be ; but he was so heedless and rackety that I shrunk from making him a confidant as yet ; and often in the lone hours of the night, when I was officer of deck-watch, and my men, muffled in their greatcoats, were clus- tered under the lee of the boats, the bulwarks, or the break of the poop, while the great steamer sped silently and surely on her way up the mighty Bay of Bengal, her screw leaving a long and snowy wake in the seething waves astern, her canvas bellyiftg out upon the breeze, the heavens cloudless and starry, the waves around us like silver, the dark cordage towering aloft taut to wind- ward, in graceful bights and bends to lee- ward, the smoky pennant from the black funnel rolling far away over our watery track; — often, I say, in such quiet hours as these, the image of the girl to whom I was hastening came before me with a strange distinctness, while I built airy castles, of which she was the sole empress and chatelaine, with flowers climbing the walls, birds singing in every window, and sunshine over everything. 280 FAIRER THAN A FAIRY. Then those tender eyes would seem to look into mine again, and that wondrous hair to sweep softly over my face, when even the sharp spoon-drift of the sea was unfelt, till, like a very boy, I yearned for her — ye'arned in the heart of a man who had fought his way through the embrasures of the Eedan to the hell of strife that reigned within it. I expected to be in quarters at Dumdum for some time. This would afford me ample opportunities for visiting the Binghams, and I thought over every means by which I might ingratiate myself with the family, and studied every point, even as to whether I should first present myself in uniform or mufti. She had assured me that I should easily win over ' mamma ;' and I prayed Heaven that it might be so. It was pleasant to dream over all the probabilities and eventu- alities, through the medium of a mild havanna amid the soft atmosphere of the Indian night, ere the ship's bell clanged to change the watch. The procession to church, the bells, the benediction, the bride's bonnet, and then her travelling costume (what would it be in THE PUNNIAR. 281 India ?), the breakfast, and the regimental band. Then there would be six bridesmaids of course — all the creme cle la creme of Chow- ' ringhee, Garden Eeach, or whatever was the ' swell ' place ; nothing visible of them but their heads and snowy shoulders amid a sea of white tulle, or would it be Dacca muslin ? Was it my duty or that of the groomsman to insert my regulation sword, in the true Indian fashion, in the crusted wedding-cake, for the first cut thereof ? And so on, and so on, the bright and pleasant phantasmagoria was woven, while the stately Punniar sped on her way with her living freight, while the screw revolved without ceasing, while the wind hummed through the rigging aloft, while the waves ran merrily past in silver sheen, and sometimes the lights of Madras, Pondicherry, or Pullicat were visible as we glided along the coast of Coromandel. END OF VOL. I. u LONDON : SWIFT AND CO., KEGENT PRESS, KING STREET, REGENT STREET, W. ' X / UNIVERSITY OF ILUN0I9-URBANA 3 0112 046409725