“You have brought me down here on a regular fool’s errand,” said Mr. Leslie, on their journey back to town.
“It will all come right yet,” replied Miss Jack. “Take my word for it he loves her.”
“Fudge,” said Mr. Leslie. But he could not afford to quarrel with his rich connection.
In spite of all that he had said and thought to the contrary, Maurice did look forward during the remainder of the summer to his return to Spanish Town with something like impatience, it was very dull work, being there alone at Mount Pleasant; and let him do what he would to prevent it, his very dreams took him to Shandy Hall. But at last the slow time made itself away, and he found himself once more in his aunt’s house.
A couple of days passed and no word was said about the Leslies. On the morning of the third day he determined to go to Shandy Hall. Hitherto he had never been there without staying for the night; but on this occasion he made up his mind to return the same day. “It would not be civil of me not to go there,” he said to his aunt.
“Certainly not,” she replied, forbearing to press the matter further. “But why make such a terrible hard day’s work of it?”
“Oh, I shall go down in the cool, before breakfast; and then I need not have the bother of taking a bag.”
And in this way he started. Miss Jack said nothing further; but she longed in her heart that she might be at Marian’s elbow unseen during the visit.
He found them all at breakfast, and the first to welcome him at the hall door was Marian. “Oh, Mr. Cumming, we are so glad to see you;” and she looked into his eyes with a way she had, that was enough to make a man’s heart wild. But she not call him Maurice now.
Miss Jack had spoken to her sister, Mrs. Leslie, as well as to Mr. Leslie, about this marriage scheme. “Just let them alone,” was Mrs. Leslie’s advice. “You can’t alter Marian by lecturing her. If they really love each other they’ll come together; and if they don’t, why then they’d better not.”
“And you really mean that you’re going back to Spanish Town to-day?” said Mrs. Leslie to her visitor.
“I’m afraid I must. Indeed I haven’t brought my things with me.” And then he again caught Marian’s eye, and began to wish that his resolution had not been so sternly made.
“I suppose you are so fond of that House of Assembly,” said Marian, “that you cannot tear yourself away for more than one day. You’ll not be able, I suppose, to find time to come to our picnic next week?”
Maurice said he feared that he should not have time to go to a picnic.
“Oh, nonsense,” said Fanny—one of the younger girls—“you must come. We can’t do without him, can we?”
“Marian has got your name down the first on the list of the gentlemen,” said another.
“Yes; and Captain Ewing’s second,” said Bell, the youngest.
“I’m afraid I must induce your sister to alter her list,” said Maurice, in his sternest manner. “I cannot manage to go, and I’m sure she will not miss me.”
Marion looked at the little girl who had so unfortunately mentioned the warrior’s name, and the little girl knew that she had sinned.
“Oh, we cannot possibly do without you; can we, Marian?” said Fanny. “It’s to be at Bingley’s Dell, and we’ve got a bed for you at Newcastle; quite near, you know.”
“And another for—” began Bell, but she stopped herself.
“Go away to your lessons, Bell,” said Marion. “You know how angry mamma will be at your staying here all the morning;” and poor Bell with a sorrowful look left the room.
“We are all certainly very anxious that you should come; very anxious for a great many reasons,” said Marian, in a voice that was rather solemn, and as though the matter were one of considerable import. “But if you really cannot, why of course there is no more to be said.”
“There will be plenty without me, I am sure.”
“As regards numbers, I dare say there will; for we shall have pretty nearly the whole of the two regiments;” and Marian as she alluded to the officers spoke in a tone which might lead one to think that she would much rather be without them; “but we counted on you as being one of ourselves; and as you had been away so long, we thought—we thought—,” and then she turned away her face, and did not finish her speech. Before he could make up his mind as to his answer she had risen from her chair, and walked out of the room. Maurice almost thought that he saw a tear in her eye as she went.
He did ride back to Spanish Town that afternoon, after an early dinner; but before he went Marian spoke to him alone for one minute.
“I hope you are not offended with me,” she said.
“Offended! oh no; how could I be offended with you?”
“Because you seem so stern. I am sure I would do anything I could to oblige you, if I knew how. It would be so shocking not to be good friends with a cousin like you.”
“But there are so many different sorts of friends,” said Maurice.
“Of course there are. There are a great many friends that one does not care a bit for,—people that one meets at balls and places like that—”
“And at picnics,” said Maurice.
“Well, some of them there too; but we are not like that; are we?”
What could Maurice do but say, “no,” and declare that their friendship was of a warmer description? And how could he resist promising to go to the picnic, though as he made the promise he knew that misery would be in store for him? He did promise, and then she gave him her hand and called him Maurice.
“Oh! I am so glad,” she said. “It seemed so shocking that you should refuse to join us. And mind and be early, Maurice; for I shall want to explain it all. We are to meet, you know, at Clifton Gate at one o’clock, but do you be a little before that, and we shall be there.”
Maurice Cumming resolved within his own breast as he rode back to Spanish Town, that if Marian behaved to him all that day at the picnic as she had done this day at Shandy Hall, he would ask her to be his wife before he left her.
And Miss Jack also was to be at the picnic.
“There is no need of going early,” said she, when her nephew made a fuss about the starting. “People are never very punctual at such affairs as that; and then they are always quite long enough.” But Maurice explained that he was anxious to be early, and on this occasion he carried his point.
When they reached Clifton Gate the ladies were already there; not in carriages, as people go to picnics in other and tamer countries, but each on her own horse or her own pony. But they were not alone. Beside Miss Leslie was a gentleman, whom Maurice knew as Lieutenant Graham, of the flag-ship at Port Royal; and at a little distance which quite enabled him to join in the conversation was Captain Ewing, the lieutenant with the narrow waist of the previous year.
“We shall have a delightful day, Miss Leslie,” said the lieutenant.
“Oh, charming, isn’t it?” said Marian.
“But now to choose a place for dinner, Captain Ewing;—what do you say?”
“Will you commission me to select? You know I’m very well up in geometry, and all that?”
“But that won’t teach you what sort of a place does for a picnic dinner;—will it, Mr. Cumming?” And then she shook hands with Maurice, but did not take any further special notice of him. “We’ll all go together, if you please. The commission is too important to be left to one.” And then Marian rode off, and the lieutenant and the captain rode with her.
It was open for Maurice to join them if he chose, but he did not choose. He had come there ever so much earlier than he need have done, dragging his aunt with him, because Marian had told him that his services would be specially required by her. And now as soon as she saw him she went away with the two officers!—went away without vouchsafing him a word. He made up his mind, there on the spot, that he would never think of her again—never speak to her otherwise than he might speak to the most indifferent of mortals.
And yet he was a man that could struggle right manfully with the world’s troubles; one who had struggled with them from his boyhood, and had never been overcome. Now he was unable to conceal the bitterness of his wrath because a little girl had ridden off to look for a green spot for her tablecloth without asking his assistance!
Picnics are, I think, in general, rather tedious for the elderly people who accompany them. When the joints become a little stiff, dinners are eaten most comfortably with the accompaniment of chairs and tables, and a roof overhead is an agrément de plus. But, nevertheless, picnics cannot exist without a certain allowance of elderly people. The Miss Marians and Captains Ewing cannot go out to dine on the grass without some one to look after them. So the elderly people go to picnics, in a dull tame way, doing their duty, and wishing the day over. Now on the morning in question, when Marian rode off with Captain Ewing and lieutenant Graham, Maurice Cumming remained among the elderly people.
A certain Mr. Pomken, a great Jamaica agriculturist, one of the Council, a man who had known the good old times, got him by the button and held him fast, discoursing wisely of sugar and ruin, of Gadsden pans and recreant negroes, on all of which subjects Maurice Cumming was known to have an opinion of his own. But as Mr. Pomken’s words sounded into one ear, into the other fell notes, listened to from afar,—the shrill laughing voice of Marian Leslie as she gave her happy order to her satellites around her, and ever and anon the bass haw-haw of Captain Ewing, who was made welcome as the chief of her attendants. That evening in a whisper to a brother councillor Mr. Pomken communicated his opinion that after all there was not so much in that young Cumming as some people said. But Mr. Pomken had no idea that that young Cumming was in love.
And then the dinner came, spread over half an acre. Maurice was among the last who seated himself; and when he did so it was in an awkward comfortless corner, behind Mr. Pomken’s back, and far away from the laughter and mirth of the day. But yet from his comfortless corner he could see Marian as she sat in her pride of power, with her friend Julia Davis near her, a flirt as bad as herself, and her satellites around her, obedient to her nod, and happy in her smiles.
“Now I won’t allow any more champagne,” said Marian, “or who will there be steady enough to help me over the rocks to the grotto?”
“Oh, you have promised me!” cried the captain.
“Indeed, I have not; have I, Julia?”
“Miss Davis has certainly promised me,” said the lieutenant.
“I have made no promise, and don’t think I shall go at all,” said Julia, who was sometimes inclined to imagine that Captain Ewing should be her own property.
All which and much more of the kind Maurice Cumming could not hear; but he could see—and imagine, which was worse. How innocent and inane are, after all, the flirtings of most young ladies, if all their words and doings in that line could be brought to paper! I do not know whether there be as a rule more vocal expression of the sentiment of love between a man and woman than there is between two thrushes! They whistle and call to each other, guided by instinct rather than by reason.
“You are going home with the ladies to-night, I believe,” said Maurice to Miss Jack, immediately after dinner. Miss Jack acknowledged that such was her destination for the night.
“Then my going back to Spanish Town at once won’t hurt any one—for, to tell the truth, I have had enough of this work.”
“Why, Maurice, you were in such a hurry to come.”
“The more fool I; and so now I am in a hurry to go away. Don’t notice it to anybody.”
Miss Jack looked in his face and saw that he was really wretched; and she knew the cause of his wretchedness.
“Don’t go yet, Maurice,” she said; and then added with a tenderness that was quite uncommon with her, “Go to her, Maurice, and speak to her openly and freely, once for all; you will find that she will listen then. Dear Maurice, do, for my sake.”
He made no answer, but walked away, roaming sadly by himself among the trees. “Listen!” he exclaimed to himself. “Yes, she will alter a dozen times in as many hours. Who can care for a creature that can change as she changes?” And yet he could not help caring for her.
As he went on, climbing among rocks, he again came upon the sound of voices, and heard especially that of Captain Ewing. “Now, Miss Leslie, if you will take my hand you will soon be over all the difficulty.” And then a party of seven or eight, scrambling over some stones, came nearly on the level on which he stood, in full view of him; and leading the others were Captain Ewing and Miss Leslie.
He turned on his heel to go away, when he caught the sound of a step following him, and a voice saying, “Oh, there is Mr. Cumming, and I want to speak to him;” and in a minute a light hand was on his arm.
“Why are you running away from us?” said Marian.
“Because—oh, I don’t know. I am not running away. You have your party made up, and I am not going to intrude on it.”
“What nonsense! Do come now; we are going to this wonderful grotto. I thought it so ill-natured of you, not joining us at dinner. Indeed you know you had promised.”
He did not answer her, but he looked at her—full in the face, with his sad eyes laden with love. She half understood his countenance, but only half understood it.
“What is the matter, Maurice?” she said. “Are you angry with me? Will you come and join us?”
“No, Marian, I cannot do that. But if you can leave them and come with me for half an hour, I will not keep you longer.”
She stood hesitating a moment, while her companion remained on the spot where she had left him. “Come, Miss Leslie,” called Captain Ewing. “You will have it dark before we can get down.”
“I will come with you,” whispered she to Maurice, “but wait a moment.” And she tripped back, and in some five minutes returned after an eager argument with her friends. “There,” she said, “I don’t care about the grotto, one bit, and I will walk with you now;—only they will think it so odd.” And so they started off together.
Before the tropical darkness had fallen upon them Maurice had told the tale of his love,—and had told it in a manner differing much from that of Marian’s usual admirers, he spoke with passion and almost with violence; he declared that his heart was so full of her image that he could not rid himself of it for one minute; “nor would he wish to do so,” he said, “if she would be his Marian, his own Marian, his very own. But if not—” and then he explained to her, with all a lover’s warmth, and with almost more than a lover’s liberty, what was his idea of her being “his own, his very own,” and in doing so inveighed against her usual light-heartedness in terms which at any rate were strong enough.
But Marian here it all well. Perhaps she knew that the lesson was somewhat deserved; and perhaps she appreciated at its value the love of such a man as Maurice Cumming, weighing in her judgment the difference between him and the Ewings and the Grahams.
And then she answered him well and prudently, with words which startled him by their prudent seriousness as coming from her. She begged his pardon heartily, she said, for any grief which she had caused him; but yet how was she to be blamed, seeing that she had known nothing of his feelings? Her father and mother had said something to her of this proposed marriage; something, but very little; and she had answered by saying that she did not think Maurice had any warmer regard for her than of a cousin. After this answer neither father nor mother had pressed the matter further. As to her own feelings she could then say nothing, for she then knew nothing;—nothing but this, that she loved no one better than him, or rather that she loved no one else. She would ask herself if she could love him; but he must give her some little time for that. In the meantime—and she smiled sweetly at him as she made the promise—she would endeavour to do nothing that would offend him; and then she added that on that evening she would dance with him any dances that he liked. Maurice, with a self-denial that was not very wise, contented himself with engaging her for the first quadrille.
They were to dance that night in the mess-room of the officers at Newcastle. This scheme had been added on as an adjunct to the picnic, and it therefore became necessary that the ladies should retire to their own or their friends’ houses at Newcastle to adjust their dresses. Marian Leslie and Julia Davis were there accommodated with the loan of a small room by the major’s wife, and as they were brushing their hair, and putting on their dancing-shoes, something was said between them about Maurice Cumming.
“And so you are to be Mrs. C. of Mount Pleasant,” said Julia. “Well; I didn’t think it would come to that at last.”
“But it has not come to that, and if it did why should I not be Mrs. C., as you call it?”
“The knight of the rueful countenance, I call him.”
“I tell you what then, he is an excellent young man, and the fact is you don’t know him.”
“I don’t like excellent young men with long faces. I suppose you won’t be let to dance quick dances at all now.”
“I shall dance whatever dances I like, as I have always done,” said Marian, with some little asperity in her tone.
“Not you; or if you do, you’ll lose your promotion. You’ll never live to be my Lady Rue. And what will Graham say? You know you’ve given him half a promise.”
“That’s not true, Julia;—I never gave him the tenth part of a promise.”
“Well, he says so;” and then the words between the young ladies became a little more angry. But, nevertheless, in due time they came forth with faces smiling as usual, with their hair brushed, and without any signs of warfare.
But Marian had to stand another attack before the business of the evening commenced, and this was from no less doughty an antagonist than her aunt, Miss Jack. Miss Jack soon found that Maurice had not kept his threat of going home; and though she did not absolutely learn from him that he had gone so far towards perfecting her dearest hopes as to make a formal offer to Marion, nevertheless she did gather that things were fast that way tending. If only this dancing were over! she said to herself, dreading the unnumbered waltzes with Ewing, and the violent polkas with Graham. So Miss Jack resolved to say one word to Marian—“A wise word in good season,” said Miss Jack to herself, “how sweet a thing it is.”
“Marian,” said she. “Step here a moment, I want to say a word to you.”
“Yes, aunt Sarah,” said Marian, following her aunt into a corner, not quite in the best humour in the world; for she had a dread of some further interference.
“Are you going to dance with Maurice to-night?”
“Yes, I believe so,—the first quadrille.”
“Well, what I was going to say is this. I don’t want you to dance many quick dances to-night, for a reason I have;—that is, not a great many.”
“Why, aunt, what nonsense!”
“Now my dearest, dearest girl, it is all for your own sake. Well, then, it must out. He does not like it, you know.”
“What he?”
“Maurice.”
“Well, aunt, I don’t know that I’m bound to dance or not to dance just as Mr. Cumming may like. Papa does not mind my dancing. The people have come here to dance and you can hardly want to make me ridiculous by sitting still.” And so that wise word did not appear to be very sweet.
And then the amusement of the evening commenced, and Marian stood up for a quadrille with her lover. She however was not in the very best humour. She had, as she thought, said and done enough for one day in Maurice’s favour. And she had no idea, as she declared to herself, of being lectured by aunt Sarah.
“Dearest Marion,” he said to her, as the quadrille came to a close, “it is an your power to make me so happy,—so perfectly happy.”
“But then people have such different ideas of happiness,” she replied. “They can’t all see with the same eyes, you know.” And so they parted.
But during the early part of the evening she was sufficiently discreet; she did waltz with Lieutenant Graham, and polk with Captain Ewing, but she did so in a tamer manner than was usual with her, and she made no emulous attempts to dance down other couples. When she had done she would sit down, and then she consented to stand up for two quadrilles with two very tame gentlemen, to whom no lover could object.
“And so, Marian, your wings are regularly clipped at last,” said Julia Davis coming up to her.
“No more clipped than your own,” said Marian.
“If Sir Rue won’t let you waltz now, what will he require of you when you’re married to him?”
“I am just as well able to waltz with whom I like as you are, Julia; and if you say so in that way, I shall think it’s envy.”
“Ha—ha—ha; I may have envied you some of your beaux before now; I dare say I have. But I certainly do not envy you Sir Rue.” And then she went off to her partner.
All this was too much for Marian’s weak strength, and before long she was again whirling round with Captain Ewing. “Come, Miss Leslie,” said he, “let us see what we can do. Graham and Julia Davis have been saying that your waltzing days are over, but I think we can put them down.”
Marian as she got up, and raised her arm in order that Ewing might put his round her waist, caught Maurice’s eye as he leaned against a wall, and read in it a stern rebuke. “This is too bad,” she said to herself. “He shall not make a slave of me, at any rate as yet.” And away she went as madly, more madly than ever, and for the rest of the evening she danced with Captain Ewing and with him alone.
There is an intoxication quite distinct from that which comes from strong drink. When the judgment is altogether overcome by the spirits this species of drunkenness comes on, and in this way Marian Leslie was drunk that night. For two hours she danced with Captain Ewing, and ever and anon she kept saying to herself that she would teach the world to know—and of all the world Mr. Cumming especially—that she might be lead, but not driven.
Then about four o’clock she went home, and as she attempted to undress herself in her own room she burst into violent tears and opened her heart to her sister—“Oh, Fanny, I do love him, I do love him so dearly! and now he will never come to me again!”
Maurice stood still with his back against the wall, for the full two hours of Marian’s exhibition, and then he said to his aunt before he left—“I hope you have now seen enough; you will hardly mention her name to me again.” Miss Jack groaned from the bottom of her heart but she said nothing. She said nothing that night to any one; but she lay awake in her bed, thinking, till it was time to rise and dress herself. “Ask Miss Marian to come to me,” she said to the black girl who came to assist her. But it was not till she had sent three times, that Miss Marian obeyed the summons.
At three o’clock on the following day Miss Jack arrived at her own hall door in Spanish Town. Long as the distance was she ordinarily rode it all, but on this occasion she had provided a carriage to bring her over as much of the journey as it was practicable for her to perform on wheels. As soon as she reached her own hall door she asked if Mr. Cumming was at home. “Yes,” the servant said. “He was in the small book-room, at the back of the house, up stairs.” Silently, as if afraid of being heard, she stepped up her own stairs into her own drawing-room; and very silently she was followed by a pair of feet lighter and smaller than her own.
Miss Jack was usually somewhat of a despot in her own house, but there was nothing despotic about her now as she peered into the book-room. This she did with her bonnet still on, looking round the half-opened door as though she were afraid to disturb her nephew, he sat at the window looking out into the verandah which ran behind the house, so intent on his thoughts that he did not hear her.
“Maurice,” she said, “can I come in?”
“Come in? oh yes, of course;” and he turned round sharply at her. “I tell you what, aunt; I am not well here and I cannot stay out the session. I shall go back to Mount Pleasant.”
“Maurice,” and she walked close up to him as she spoke, “Maurice, I have brought some one with me to ask your pardon.”
His face became red up to the roots of his hair as he stood looking at her without answering. “You would grant it certainly,” she continued, “if you knew how much it would be valued.”
“Whom do you mean? who is it?” he asked at last.
“One who loves you as well as you love her—and she cannot love you better. Come in, Marian.” The poor girl crept in at the door, ashamed of what she was induced to do, but yet looking anxiously into her lover’s face. “You asked her yesterday to be your wife,” said Miss Jack, “and she did not then know her own mind. Now she has had a lesson. You will ask her once again; will you not, Maurice?”
What was he to say? how was he to refuse, when that soft little hand was held out to him; when those eyes laden with tears just ventured to look into his face?
“I beg your pardon if I angered you last night,” she said.
In half a minute Miss Jack had left the room, and in the space of another thirty seconds Maurice had forgiven her. “I am your own now, you know,” she whispered to him in the course of that long evening. “Yesterday, you know—,” but the sentence was never finished.