Complete Works of Sheridan Le Fanu (Illustrated), page 327
“Well, they don’t know; but once it’s settled, I do suppose it won’t be long delayed. Why should it?”
“No why, once it’s settled, as you say.”
“And is it not well for him, poor fellow, he should have some one to love him, and look after him? What’s the good o’ life without kindness? Both o’ them handsome, and young, and loving. What more need they ask?” said old Winnie. “And if they aren’t happy, who will?”
“Yes, old Winnie, they will, very happy, I’m sure; and now I’ll bid you goodnight, I’m so tired, very tired; it’s a long tedious way, and I’m always wishing to come back to you, and dear old grannie, and poor old Gilroyd, where we were all so happy, where I always feel so safe — but I believe we always fancy the old times the pleasantest — when I was a child. Goodnight, old Winnie.”
CHAPTER XLVI.
VANE TREVOR AT THE WINDOW.
WILLIAM MAUBRAY liked the appointment which his kind friend, Doctor Sprague, had virtually secured for him. It was not a great deal in salary, but opening abundant opportunities for that kind of employment which he most coveted, and for which, in fact, a very little training would now suffice to accomplish him. Literary work, the ambition of so many, not a wise one perhaps for those who have any other path before them, but to which men will devote themselves, as to a perverse marriage, contrary to other men’s warnings, and even to their own legible experiences of life — in a dream.
For three years he would sojourn in Paris. He preferred that distant exile to one at the gates of the early paradise from which he had been excluded. From thence he would send to his good friend, Doctor Sprague, those little intimations of his doings and his prosperings, which he, according to his wisdom, might transmit, for inspection to the old lady at Gilroyd, who might, if she pleased, re-open a distant correspondence with the outcast.
Doctor Sprague, at William’s desire, had written to accept and arrange, and would hear by the return of post, or nearly, and then William might have to leave at a day’s notice. Three years! It was a long time, and Aunt Dinah old! He might never see her or Gilroyd more, and a kind of home sickness fell upon him.
At Gilroyd that morning, Aunt Dinah and Vi sat at breakfast tête-à-tête. The spirits of the old lady were not altogether so bright, the alacrity was gone, and though she smiled there was a sadness and a subsidence. William was banished. The pang of that sharp decision was over. Some little help he should have circuitously through Doctor Sprague; but meet again on earth they never should. So that care was over: and now her other tie, pretty Violet Darkwell, she, too, was going: and although she sat beside her at the little breakfast-table, prattling pleasantly, and telling her all the news of her friends, the Mainwarings and their new neighbours, yet her voice sounded already faint in distance, and the old lady’s cares were pretty well over. Our business here is work of some sort, and not for ourselves; and when that is ended it is time, as Fuller says, to put out the candle and go to bed.
“I’m going to see old Mrs. Wagget to-day. I promised her the day before I went to the Mainwarings,” said Vi, recalling this engagement.
“But, my dear, some one may call here. Your friends and mine will be looking in,” said Aunt Dinah, who knew that Trevor would arrive at about twelve o’clock.
“Well, I can return their visits all the same, and see them in their own houses,” said Vi, “just as well.”
“And what need to go to Mrs. Wagget to-day — tomorrow I fancy would answer,” said Miss Perfect.
“But I promised,’ you know, and she wrote to remind me.”
“Promised to leave your old granny alone again the day after your return!” she exclaimed, a little huffed.
“Why, darling, it was you who made me promise, don’t you recollect?” pleaded Miss Violet, “the day we paid them our last visit.”
“H’m did I? Well, if there really was a promise, and I suppose you remember, we must keep it, I suppose.” Aunt Dinah had made that kind of scrupulousness an emphatic point in Violet’s simple education, and of course it could not now be trifled with. And now she did recollect the appointment, and something about walking to the school-house together at twelve o’clock — could anything be more unlucky? Aunt Dinah looked up at the sky; but no, it was not threatening — clear blue, with a pleasant white cloud or two, and a sea of sunshine.
“I’m so sorry, granny, we settled, it would have been so much pleasanter to have staid with you to-day, and I’m afraid it’s very wicked; but that school, except to very good people, it is really insupportable,” said Miss Vi, whose inflexible estimate of such appointments rather vexed Aunt Dinah, and not the less that she could not deny that it was her own work.
“It’s right in the main,” thought she. “But there are distinctions — there’s danger, however, in casuistry, and so let it be.” There was an odd little sense of relief too in the postponement of the crisis.
At about halfpast eleven, Vane Trevor arrived. He came by the path, and from the drawingroom window Miss Perfect, sitting there at her work, saw him, and knocked and beckoned with her slender mittened hand.
He looks pale, poor young man,” he was smiling as he approached, “and haggard too,” she pronounced, notwithstanding. “He’s anxious, I dare say,” and she pushed up the window as he approached. “What a sweet morning,” she said, taking off her gold spectacles, and smiling with that soft look of sympathy which in such cases makes even old women’s faces so pretty again.
“Charming morning — really quite charming.”
She saw him peeping into the shadow of the room for a second figure. Aunt Dinah’s hand was now within reach, and they exchanged a friendly greeting.
“My little Violet has returned,” she said, still holding Trevor’s hand kindly, “ quite well — looking so well — and most unluckily I quite forgot; but I had made an appointment for her this morning with Mrs. Wagget, and I have always made the keeping of appointments so much a moral duty with her, that unless I had opened the subject on which you talked with me, and told her plainly that I expected your call, and that she must wait — which would have been not a favourable way of proceeding; and in fact I should have been obliged to say very badly what you would say, probably, very well; and indeed it is a thing that makes me nervous — always did. When my dear sister was proposed for, I refused to take the message, in fact — I could not — and — he spoke for himself — poor Charles Maubray — like a man — and — and a very happy” — Suddenly she stopped, and Trevor saw that tears were trickling slowly down her cheeks; and her lips were resolutely closed; and she fumbled for a minute or two among her silks and worsteds; and the young man felt that he liked her better than ever he did before; and he sat on the window-stone outside, and they chatted kindly for a long time. Then they took a little walk together among the flowers, and under the chestnuts, till it grew to be near two o’clock, and Aunt Dinah began to look for Violet’s return; and if the great Duke of Wellington on the field of Waterloo consulted his watch half so often as Mr. Vane Trevor did his on the green sward of Gilroyd that afternoon, I’m not surprised at it having excited all the observation it did, and being noted in the history of that great day of thunder and suspense.
Not the Iron Duke, however, but his Imperial rival on the field, when lowering his glass, he muttered, “C’est les Prussien,” is the fitter representative of our friend Vane Trevor, when, not Miss Violet Darkwell, but old Mrs. Wagget’s page, a thick and stunted “buttons,” in rifle green regimentals, moved down upon his flank, with a note in his hand for Miss Perfect, who was entreated by the writer to allow Miss Violet to stay dinner, with a promise that she should arrive safe at Gilroyd in the brougham that evening at nine!
There was nothing for it but submission. It would not do, in presence of that dwarfish page, who was eyeing Vane with the curiosity of a youthful gossip, to order the young lady home, detain the young gentleman where he stood, and thus by a feat of discipline compel a meeting.
So Miss Perfect despatched her reply, thanking — I hope it was sincerely — Felicia Honoria Wagget, and accepting the arrangement with the best grace she might.
“You must come in and take some luncheon,” said Aunt Dinah.
Gilroyd was somehow so charming a spot, its resources had grown so inexhaustible, and old Miss Perfect so sensible and altogether interesting that Trevor was glad to linger a little, and postpone the evil hour of departure. It came at last, however, and Aunt Dinah called old Winnie Dobbs, and went listlessly to her room to make her toilet for her solitary dinner.
CHAPTER XLVII.
MISS PERFECT’S TOILET.
“SHORT the evenings growing,” said Aunt Dinah, looking out upon the slanting amber sunlight, that made the landscape all so golden. “Long shadows already!” and she glanced at her broad old gold watch. “How the years go over us; Winnie, you’ve been a long time with me now — ha, ha, a Long time. When first you came to me, you thought me such a shrew, and I thought you such a fool, that we both thought a parting must very soon come of it — an old termagant and an old goose,” continued Miss Perfect, nodding her head at her image in the glass. “We were not altogether wrong in that, perhaps, old Dobbs — don’t interrupt me — but, though we were neither lambs nor Solomons, we answered one another. We never parted, and we’ll live on so, don’t you think, to the end of the chapter, and a pretty long chapter it has been, and pretty near the end, Winnie Dobbs, it must be for both of us. ‘Here endeth the first lesson,’ and then comes the judgment, Winnie— ‘here endeth the second lesson,’ — our two great lessons, death and judgment: think of that, my good old Winnie, when you hear Doctor Mainwaring or Doctor Wagget, it is now, saying, ‘here endeth the first lesson,’ and ‘here endeth the second lesson,’ and much good may it do you.”
Aunt Dinah’s lectures on such themes were generally very odd, and her manner sometimes a little flighty — people who did not know her would have almost said waggish. But her handmaiden received them always with a reverent acquiescence, having as full a faith in her mistress as honest Sancho, in his most trusting moods, ever reposed in the wisdom of the Knight of La Mancha.
“Death and judgment, sure enough. Death, at any rate, that’s certain,” maundered old Dobbs.
“And judgment, too, I hope,” said Aunt Dinah, sharply, “And judgment, too,” supplemented Winnie.
“What do you mean, old Dobbs, as if one was more certain than the other?”
“Ay, indeed. What is there certain? — nothing — nothing,” she continued, not exactly apprehending her mistress. a Tut, tut! Dobbs. Give me a pin — you don’t intend — but you sometimes say things that make my flesh creep — yes — you don’t know it — but you do.”
“Dear me, Ma’am,” ejaculated old Winnie, who was never very much startled by Aunt Dinah’s violent remarks.
“So, I think, old Dobbs, we shall soon have a wedding here,” said Miss Perfect, after a silence, changing the subject.
“Well, well, I should not wonder, Ma’am,” answered she.
“But you’re not to say one word about it to Miss Violet until she speaks to you — do you mind — not a word — and that will be, I think, tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow!” exclaimed Winnie.
“Not the wedding, old goose, but the talk of it I think it will be all settled tomorrow, and I’m glad, and I’m sorry. Give me my snuff-box — thanks. She has never spoken to you on the subject?” said Aunt Dinah.
“No, no, Ma’am; never,” answered Winnie.
“Nor to me. But I know all about it from another quarter, and I hope she’ll not be a fool. She’ll never have so good an offer again. I like him extremely. I have the best opinion of him, and the sergeant is very much pleased; indeed, it’s quite unexceptionable, and I do expect, Winnie Dobbs, if she should talk to you, you’ll not try to frighten her. You and I are old maids, and I believe we chose wisely; but we are not to frighten nervous girls by drawing terrific pictures of matrimony, and maundering about bad husbands and unprovided children; young girls are so easily frightened away from anything that’s prudent: and, though we are old maids, there’s a good deal to be said on the other side of the question — so, do you mind?”
“Dear me, Ma’am, I’d be sorry she wasn’t to get a good husband, I would.”
“And you remember the last evening, Friday last, when we were in the study, at the table, you know, where the word ‘eminently’ came. Do you remember?”
“Well, I ought to, I’m sure; but my old head is not as good at bringing a thing to mind as it used to be,” hesitated Winnie.
“No more it is; but the word eminently was all we got that night, and you didn’t know what the question was. Well, I’ll tell you. I asked simply, will Violet Darkwell’s marriage — hook my body, please — will Violet Darkwell’s marriage prove happy? and the answer was eminently.”
“Ay, so it was, I’ll be bound, though I can’t bring it to mind; but it’s a hard word for the like o’ me to come round.”
“You are provoking, Winnie Dobbs,” exclaimed her mistress, looking at herself defiantly in the glass.
“Well, dear me! I often think I am,” acquiesced Winnie.
“Well, Winnie, we are too old to change much now — the leopard his spots, and the Ethiopian his skin. There’s no good in trying to teach an old dog tricks. They must make the best of us now, Winnie, such as we are; and if this wedding does happen, I’ll trick you out in a new dress, silk every inch, for the occasion, and the handsomest cap I can find in Saxton. I’ll make you such a dandy, you’ll not know yourself in the looking-glass. You’ll come to the church as her own maid, you know j but you’re not to go away with her. You’ll stay with me, Winnie. I don’t think you’d like to leave Gilroyd.”
Old Winnie hereupon witnessed a good and kindly confession.
CHAPTER XLVIII.
THE PRODIGAL.
THEN came one of those little silences, during which thoughts glide on with the stroke, as it were, of the last sentence or two; and old Winnie Dobbs said at last:
“But I don’t think it would be like a wedding if Master Willie wasn’t here.”
“Stop that,” said Miss Perfect, grimly, and placing the end of the comb, with which she had been adjusting her gray locks, that lay smoothly over her resolute forehead, on a sudden upon old Winnie’s wrist. “I never change my mind when once I’ve made it up. You don’t know, and you can’t know, for your wits are always wool-gathering, all I’ve done for that boy — young man, indeed, I ought to call him — nor the measure of his perversity and ingratitude. I’ve supported him — I’ve educated him — I’ve been everything to him — and at the first opportunity he has turned on me. If I were a total stranger, a Cam bridge doctor, or anything else that had never cared or thought about him, he’d have listened to what I had to say, and been influenced by it. He has refused me for his friend — renounced me — chosen other advisers — he’ll soon be married,”
“Dearie me!” interpolated old Winnie, in honest sympathy.
“And although Mr. Trevor wrote to him yesterday to mention my view and conviction, that his marriage ought to be postponed for some little time, I know perfectly it won’t have the slightest effect, no more than those birds twittering.”
The sparrows in the glittering ivy were gossiping merrily in the beams of the setting sun.
“I simply told his friend, Mr. Trevor, and left it to him to acquaint him, not as having any claim whatever on my particular regard any longer, but as a — a human being — just that; and you know, Winnie Dobbs, when I make a resolution I can keep it; you remember— “
Miss Perfect had reached this point in her cration when old Winnie, who had been looking out of the window with unusual scrutiny, on a sudden exclaimed— “I’m blest if here baint Master William a comin’!” Aunt Dinah uttered a little exclamation, with her shut hand pressing on her breast, as she looked over her old servant’s shoulder.
I don’t know how it was, but as William Maubray entered the old iron gate, he heard the swift tread of a light foot, and Aunt Dinah, hurrying from the red brick porch, ran towards him with a little cry, and “My darling!” and threw her thin arms round his neck, and they both stood still.
“Oh! Willie, you’ve come back.”
William did not answer, he was looking down in her face, pale, with his hands very gently on her shoulders.
“Come in, darling,” she said at last.
“Am I to come in?” said William, wistfully and Softly.
And she looked at him, pleadingly with tears in her eyes, and said —
“Poor old Aunt Dinah.”
And he leant down and kissed her.
“Come in, my boy — my Willie man — my only precious boy that I was so proud of.”
And William kissed her again, and cried over her thin shoulder, and she, close laid to his breast, sobbed also; each felt the tremble in the other’s kindly arms.
Thank God it was made up now — the two loving hearts so near again — sweet and bitter the angelic love and mortal sadness — the sense of uncertainty and parting mingling with the great affection that welled up from the eternal fountain of love. Improve the hours of light.
The time is near when the poor heart will tremble no more, and all the world of loving thoughts lie in dust and silence.
“I am going to give you the silver tobacco-box that was on Marston Moor — it is the most valuable thing I have — it has the inscription on the inside of the cover. It was in my foolish old head to send it to Doctor Sprague for you. It was your ancestor’s. The ‘Warwickshire Knight,’ we called him — Sir Edwin. He joined the Parliament, you know, and took the name of Perfect. I always intended the tobacco-box for you, Willie, even when I was offended — come in — come, my darling.”
And she drew in the prodigal with her arm in his, and her hand on his fingers, liking to feel as well as to see and to hear him — to be quite sure of him!
