The next day Uncle Luke went away.
Words would fail us to describe the parting. The little man wept like a child, and Madeline threw herself, again and again, into his arms, in a perfect frenzy of passion. It was terrible to see so fierce a storm shaking the fragile form of so young a child. Madame de Berny led her, sobbing, into the house, and tried in vain to give her consolation; but for hours upon hours she wept wildly, and her little heart seemed broken.
Poor Marmaduke White was utterly at a loss how to act; but he had resolved, come what might, to accept his burthen and bear it as well as he could. Every look, every gesture of the child, especially during her fierce access of sorrow, reminded him more and more of his dead friend. Her weird and elf-like beauty, moreover, appealed to his strong artistic sense. Yes, he would do what he could for her, and trust to that Providence which feeds the literary raven to find him ways and means.
During his perplexity he found an excellent adviser in Madame de Berny. The good woman, who had a large heart for children, entered cordially into his wishes, and at the end of a long consultation readily undertook the charge of Madeline for the time being. She had plenty of leisure on her hands, the Chevalier de Berny, her husband, a professor of music, being from home, teaching, all day, while her only daughter, an actress at the Pall Mall Theatre, was engaged every evening, and nearly every day, in the pursuit of the business and the pleasures of her profession.
So it was speedily settled, and Madeline was soon installed, as an informal boarder, in the De Berny household, having a little room upstairs next to the gorgeous chamber occupied by Mademoiselle Mathilde.
The grief of childhood heals quickly, and with childhood’s inquisitiveness Madeline was soon busy observing the manners and customs of her new friends. Though her heart was still wild and weary, and though every night she sobbed as she thought of her happy home at Grayfleet, hers was too quick and keen a nature to be quite deadened by its sorrow.
And Madame de Berny was very kind; even Aunt Jane could not have been kinder. As to the Chevalier, who came in late at night and departed very early in the morning, she found him a fat, fretful, overworked, but naturally good-hearted little Frenchman, who spent the whole of his one leisure day, Sunday, in smoking a big pipe and reading the French journals. But the queen of the dwelling was Mathilde, a tall, thin blonde, with golden hair, very fine eyes, and a very hard mouth. She dressed very loudly and used a great deal of paint and powder; her whole style, indeed, was ‘fast,’ and, though she was a Frenchman’s daughter, her conversation and all her ideas were vulgarly suggestive of Cockaigne.
Her character, however, was unimpeachable; she was far too calculating and worldly wise to commit herself in any way. Her parents adored her. She had the best room in the house, a little study also where she conned her parts, and these were as the sanctuary of a saint. The Chevalier was firmly convinced that she was only prevented by the malice and wickedness of the world from becoming recognised as a great actress.
‘My daughter is too good,’ he would say to his friends; ‘it is her virtue which keeps her back. If she vere like de rest of de vomen on your stage, it would be different—ah ciel, yes I De managers are in a conspiracy to give her bad parts and to break her leetel heart.’
And Mathilde herself was of the same opinion. Her face was quite worn and haggard with brooding over her professional wrongs, her heart torn daily by the success of her rivals and the real or fancied neglect of the public. Once or twice a week she had violent fits of hysteria, during which she would think and talk of suicide. Recovering from these, she would eat a hearty dinner and drink large quantities of bottled stout—to which she was very partial, chiefly because it was said to be fattening, and her enemies in the stalls considered her too lean.
In the eyes of Madeline, who had hitherto only known the coarse beauties of Grayfleet, Mathilde was a vision of loveliness. The child loved colour and splendour and beauty, and Mathilde seemed to represent all these. The actress’s bedroom, too, was like a palace of enchantment, with its delicate rose-coloured curtains, its white French bed and bedding, its bright carpet, and its delicious perfumes.
Mathilde was not particularly fond of children, but homage from any one pleased her, and thus it happened that Madeline became a constant visitor in the sanctuary. When, one day, Mathilde opened her wardrobe and showed all her magnificent costumes, both those she used in private life and those she reserved for the theatre, the bliss of the sight was almost too much to bear. It was like a glimpse of heaven itself!
So the weeks passed away, and the new strange life was growing gradually familiar. The thought of the little Grayfleet home was still bright in the child’s mind, and every night she said a prayer that Uncle Luke had taught her, and every night she cried when she went over the beloved names, but her spirit was kindled into a new kind of feverish activity, such as she had never been conscious of before.
In the course of her daily visits to the studio, where even the misanthropic Judas, as he had been profanely christened on account of his forbidding aspect, now gave her a welcome, she saw many things which awakened her wonder. Her previous ideas of Art had been chiefly connected with house-decoration and sign-painting, and she marvelled much at the creations on canvas of young Mr. Cheveley. For White she soon contracted a passionate affection, which deepened into idolatry when the good-natured Bohemian began, in his idle moments, to teach her to draw.
The quickness with which she learned the rudiments of this accomplishment reminded White that her general education was being neglected altogether.
‘My dear,’ he said to her one afternoon, 41 think I shall have to send you to school.’
She was standing at his side, looking over his shoulder, as he ‘touched up’ for her a picture of a house which reeled to one side like the leaning tower at Pisa, a tree or two like inverted mops, and a very shabby-looking bridge.
She looked at him right in the eyes, which was her custom.
‘I hate school,’ she said emphatically.
‘So did I at your age, and the child who doesn’t always comes to be hung. But I really think you’d pay for a little schooling. You write a shocking hand, to begin with.’
‘Uncle Luke said it was beautiful writing, and as clear as print.’
‘Humph! well, you see, he looked at it from a different point of view. I don’t question its legibility, which after all is the first thing to be aimed at, but it wants style. Then, your grammar is more shady than befits the protégée of a master-stylist, like myself.’
‘What’s grammar?’ asked Madeline, swinging her right foot irritably. ‘Nouns, verbs, “I am,” “thou art,” and all that? I hate ’em all.’
White laid down the drawing on which he had been busy, and took her by the two hands.
‘You hate a good many things,’ he said mildly. ‘Pray, what do you particularly like?’
‘I like drawing. I like to hear Mamzelle singing the pretty songs, and trying on her new dresses. I like dancing, too, and music, and all that. And I like to be here with you. I like you better than Mr. Cheveley. If I was big enough I’d marry you, and then you could take me to the theayter, where Mamzelle goes.’
‘Pronounce it theatre,’ said White, while his eyes opened in amused wonder. ‘So you are beginning to think of marrying already, are you? Precocious child! And you’d marry me, would you? Why, I’m old enough to be your father, and by the time you are a young woman I shall be quite on the shelf.’
Madeline surveyed him for some moments critically; then she threw her arms round his neck and kissed him impulsively.
‘When I marry you, Mr. White,’ she said, ‘I’ll buy you a nice wig, and then, you see, no one will know!’
‘A wig—the gods forbid!’
‘A beautiful black, like the Chevalier wears. I know it’s a wig, because he takes it off and puts on a nightcap when he goes to bed.’
White threw back his head and laughed heartily; then forcing a serious look into his face, he said—
‘Don’t let us wander from the subject; I began by saying that you must go to school.’
Madeline’s face darkened, and her lips pouted.
‘I shan’t,’ she said.
‘Come, come, Madeline! Don’t you care to learn?’
‘No.’
‘Nevertheless, learning is a physic which you will be compelled to take. You mustn’t grow up a little ignoramus. English grammar, geography, and—yes, by Jove—you shall learn French and music.’
‘French!’ she cried, with a sudden sparkle in her eyes. ‘Like Mamzelle talks sometimes to her pa?’
‘Exactly.’
‘And music! I love music! And then I shall understand every word they say, and play like Mamzelle on the piano. Oh, Mr. White, do let me go to school and learn French and music!’
All. opposition being thus speedily withdrawn, White determined that Madeline should go to school forthwith. In his customary fashion, therefore, he dismissed the subject from his mind; and it is a question how soon he would have practically carried out the scheme if Madeline herself had not worried him every day with the question, ‘Oh, Mr. White, when am I to go to school and learn French and music?’ But after a consultation with the Chevalier, a school was found in the neighbourhood—which he himself attended two or three times a week—and after a slight discussion over terms, which were specially reduced in her case, Madeline was sent there as a day scholar.
Once or twice since her translation to London, Madeline had heard from her foster-mother, who was then going from house to house as a monthly nurse. Mrs. Peartree could not write herself, but she sent by deputy many fond and loving messages, which Madeline answered with letters a thousand times more passionate. Since the day of their parting, however, she had heard nothing from Uncle Luke.
But some few weeks after she went to school there arrived a letter for her bearing the post-mark of a small town in Essex. Opening it eagerly, she read as follows:—
Mi dere Madlin,—This comes from uncle Luke, hopping you are quite wel and a good gel which it leaves me at present. I be ni art-broke far away from you and mother working on the river down alonger mi cussin Joss don’t kry cos I brung you to London but be a good gel and give my umble respecs to Mister wite mi dere Madlin mi dere Madlin there be no bargis in thes parts and neer a brethren but aples be pourful big and I wish you see the aple-tree in cussin Joss his garding with luv & kisses & hopping you are a good gel & my humble respecks to mister wito good bi at present I am ever fecksonit uncle luke peartree.
P.S. Be a good gel & don’t kri cos I brung you.
Many and many a burning kiss did Madeline press on this simple epistle. She wetted it with her most tender tears, and placed it beneath her pillow at night, and carried it about all day in her bosom, to be kissed and kissed yet again. With a certain intuitive shame, she did not show it to any member of the De Berny family, whose fault was a snobbishness characteristic of shabby gentility, but she fearlessly confided in Mr. White and let him read it through. He was touched by its simple affection, penetrating through the rude orthography to the staunch and loving soul of the writer; and he encouraged the girl to talk to him of Uncle Luke and all her lowly friends.
‘Those who did not know him,’ he thought, as he listened to her eager words and watched her flushed face, ‘called poor Fred callous. It’s a lie! He had a noble heart, and so, thank God, has his little child!’