CHAPTER XXXVII.
ANOTHER CHANCE.
MR. ASHFORD, the Minor Canon, had, anyone would have supposed, as tranquil yet as pleasantly occupied a life as a man could have. He had not very much of a clergyman’s work to do. There was no need for him to harass himself about the poor, who are generally a burden upon the shoulders or hung about the neck of the parish priest; he was free from that weight which he had found himself unable to bear. He had only the morning and evening prayers to think of, very rarely even a sermon. Most clergymen like that part of their duties; they like to have it in their power to instruct, to edify, or even to torture the community in general, with perfect safety from any reprisals; but Ernest Ashford in that, as in many other things, was an exception to the general rule in his profession. He was not fond of sermons, and consequently it was a very happy thing for him that so few were required of him. He was now and then tormented by his pupils, which brought his life within the ordinary conditions of humanity; otherwise, with his daily duty in the beautiful Abbey, which was a delight to him, and the leisure of his afternoons and evenings, and the landscape that lay under his window, and the antique grace of his little house, and all his books, no existence could have been more unruffled and happy. He was as far lifted above those painful problems of common life which he could not solve, and which had weighed upon him like personal burdens in the beginning of his career, as his window was above the lovely sweep of country at the foot of the hill. What had he to do but sing Handel, to read and to muse, and to be content? These were the natural conditions of his life.
But it would appear that these conditions are not fit for perverse humanity; for few indeed are the persons so happily exempt from ordinary troubles who do not take advantage of every opportunity to drag themselves into the arena and struggle like their neighbours. Mrs. Ashford did this in what may be called the most wanton and unprovoked way. What business had he to take any interest in Lottie Despard? She was out of his sphere; the Abbey stood between them, a substantial obstacle; and many things a great deal more important—social differences, circumstances that tended to separate rather than to bring together. And it was not even in the orthodox and regular way that he had permitted this girl to trouble his life. He might have fallen in love with her, seeing her so often in the Abbey (for Lottie’s looks were remarkable enough to attract any man), and nobody could have found fault. It is true, a great many people would have found fault, in all likelihood people who had nothing to do with it and no right to interfere, but who would, as a matter of course, have pitied the poor man who had been beguiled, and indignantly denounced the designing girl; but no one would have had any right to interfere. As a clergyman of the Church of England Mr. Ashford had absolute freedom to fall in love if he pleased, and to marry if he pleased, and nobody would have dared to say a word. But he had not done this: he had not fallen in love, and he did not think of marriage; but being himself too tranquil in his well-being, without family cares or anxieties, perhaps out of the very forlornness of his happiness, his attention had been fixed—was it upon the first person he had encountered in the midst of a moral struggle harder, and therefore nobler, than his own quiescent state? Perhaps this was all. He could never be sure whether it was the girl fighting to keep her father and brother out of the mire, fighting with them to make them as honest and brave herself, or whether it was simply Lottie that interested him. Possibly it was better not to enter into this question. She was the most interesting person within his range. His brethren the Canons, Minor and Major, were respectable or dignified clergymen, very much like the rest of the profession. Within the Abbey precincts there was nobody with any particular claim upon the sympathy of his fellows, or whose moral position demanded special interest. The Uxbridges were anxious about their son, who was a careless boy, not any better than Law; but then the father and mother were quite enough to support that anxiety, and kept it to themselves as much as possible. It was not a matter of life and death, as in Law’s case, who had neither father nor mother to care what became of him, but only Lottie—a creature who herself ought to have been cared for and removed far from all such anxieties. Even the deficiency in Lottie’s character—the pain with which she was brought to see that she must herself adopt the profession which was within her reach, and come out from the shelter of home and the menial work with which she was contented, to earn money and make an independence for herself—had given her a warmer hold upon the spectator, who, finding himself unable to struggle against the world and himself, had withdrawn from that combat, yet never could quite pardon himself for having withdrawn. She, poor child, could not withdraw; she was compelled to confront the thing she hated by sheer force of necessity, and had done so—compelled, indeed, but only as those who can are compelled. Would she have fled from the contemplation of want and pain as he had done? Would she have allowed herself incapable to bear the consequences of the duty set before her, whatever it might be? Sometimes Mr. Ashford would ask himself this question: though what could be more ridiculous than the idea that a girl of twenty could judge better than a man of five-and-thirty? But he was interested in her by very reason of her possession of qualities which he did not possess. He had given her good advice, and she had taken it; but even while he gave it and pressed it upon her he had been thinking what would she have said to his problems, how would she have decided for him? All this increased his interest in Lottie. He realised, almost more strongly than she did herself, all the new difficulties that surrounded her; he divined her love, which pained him not less than the other troublous circumstances in her lot, since he could not imagine it possible that any good could come out of such a connection. That Rollo Ridsdale would marry anyone but an heiress his superior knowledge of the world forced him to doubt; he could not believe in a real honest love, ending in a marriage, between the Chevalier’s daughter and Lady Caroline’s nephew. And accordingly this, which seemed to Lottie to turn her doubtful future into a certainty of happiness, seemed to Mr. Ashford the worst of all the dangers in her lot. It would be no amusement for her, as it would be for the other; and what was to become of the girl with her father’s wife in possession of her home and such a lover in possession of her heart? His spectatorship got almost more than he could bear at times; nobody seemed to see as he did, and he was the last person in the world who could interfere to save her. Could anyone save her? He could not tell; he knew no one who would take the office upon himself; but least of all could he do it. He watched with interest which had grown into the profoundest anxiety—an anxiety which in its turn was increased tenfold by the sense that there was nothing which he could do.
Such were the feelings in his mind when the Signor joined him on his homeward way after service on the afternoon when Mrs. Daventry had so interrupted Lottie’s lesson. Augusta had sailed up the aisle and out by the door in the cloisters which adjoined the Deanery, as they came out of the room where all the surplices were hanging in their old presses, and where the clergy robed themselves. The two men came out when the rustle and flutter of the party of ladies were still in the air, and old Wykeham looking after them with cynical criticism. The hassocks in the aisles, which had been placed there for the convenience of the overflowing congregations, too great for the Abbey choir, which crowded every corner now and then, were all driven about like boats at sea by the passage of these billows of trailing silk, and Wykeham had stooped to put them back into their places. Stooping did not suit the old man, and he could not do without his natural growl. “I wish they’d stick to ’em,” he said; “plenty of dirt sticks to ’em. They sweeps up the aisles and saves us trouble; but I’d just like one o’ them heavy hassocks to stick.”
“And so should I,” said the Signor under his breath. “They are insufferable,” he said with vehemence as he emerged into the cloister. “I have made up my mind I shall not allow any intrusion again.”
“Who are insufferable, and what is the intrusion you are going to prevent?” said the Minor Canon with a smile.
“Ashford,” said the Signor with much heat, “I am not going to have you come any more to Miss Despard’s lessons. Don’t say anything to me on the subject; I know all about interest and so forth, but I can’t permit it. It’s ruin to her, and it irritates me beyond bearing. Interest? if you take any real interest in her you would see that nothing could be less for her welfare, nothing more destructive of any chances she may have——”
“My dear Rossinetti, I never was present at Miss Despard’s lesson but once.”
“It was once too much, then,” the Signor cried. “The girl is getting ruined. That woman, that Mrs. Daventry—you should have heard her whispering behind our backs with her fan in front of her face, then stopping a moment to say, ‘What a pretty song: how much you have improved.’”
The Signor made an attempt to mimic Augusta, but he had no talent that way, and the mincing tone to which he gave utterance was like nothing that had ever been heard before. But if his imitation was bad his disgust was quite genuine. He could not think of anything else; he returned again and again to the subject as they went on.
“The upper classes,” he said, “are famous for good manners. This is their good manners: Two of them thrust themselves in for their amusement to a place where a poor girl is working hard at art, and a man who has spent most of his life in learning is trying to transmit his knowledge to her. And the moment that girl begins singing they begin their loathsome chatter about Mr. this and My Lady that. Do not say anything to me, Ashford; I tell you, you shall not come, you nor anyone else, again.”
“Is she making progress?” said the Minor Canon.
“Progress? how could she, with that going on? No; sometimes she will sing like an angel, sometimes like—anyone. It drives me wild! And then our gracious patrons appear—Mr. Ridsdale (who ought to know better) and Mrs. Daventry. I ought to know better too; I will defend my doors from henceforth. To be sure, I did not mean that; you may come if you like.”
“And Mr. Ridsdale talked? How did she bear it?” said Mr. Ashford nervously.
“It is I who will not bear it,” said the musician. “And these are people who pretend to love music—pretend to know: it is insufferable. If she ever becomes a great singer——”
“If? I thought you had no doubt.”
“How was I to know I should be intruded upon like this? Poor girl. I think, after all, the best thing for her will be to marry my boy, John Purcell, and live a quiet life.”
“Marry—Purcell?”
“Why not? He is a very good musician; he will live to make a great deal of money: he has genius—positively genius. The best thing she could do would be to marry him. She is too sensitive. Susceptibility belongs to the artist temperament, but then it must be susceptibility within control. Her voice flutters like a flame when the wind is blowing. Sometimes it blows out altogether. And he loves her. She will do best to marry my John.”
“You cannot have so little perception, Rossinetti. How can you entertain such an idea for a moment? Purcell? ”
“In what is he so inferior?” said the Signor with quiet gravity. “He is young, not like you and me. That is a great deal. He is an excellent musician, and he has a home to offer to her. I should advise it if she would take my advice. It would not harm her in her career to marry a musician, if finally she accepts her career. She has not accepted it yet,” said the Signor with a sigh.
“Then all your certainty is coming to nothing,” said Mr. Ashford, “and Ridsdale’s——”
“Ah, Ridsdale—that is what harms her. Something might be done if he were out of the way. He is an influence that is too much for me. Either she has heard of his new opera, and expects to have her place secured in it, under his patronage, or else she hopes—something else.” The Signor kept his eyes fixed upon his companion. He wanted to surprise Mr. Ashford’s opinion without giving his own.
“Do you think,” said the Minor Canon indignantly, “even with the little you know of her, that she is a girl to calculate upon having a place secured to her, or upon anyone’s patronage?”
“Then she hopes for—something else; which is a great deal worse for her happiness,” said the Signor. Then there was a pause. They had reached Mr. Ashford’s door, but he did not ask his companion to go in. The Signor paused, but he had not ended what he had to say: “With the little I know of her”—he said—“do you know more?”
This was not an easy question to answer. He could not say, I have been watching her for weeks; I know almost all that can be found out; but, serious man as he was, Mr. Ashford was embarrassed. He cleared his throat, and indeed even went through a fit of coughing to gain time. “Her brother is my pupil,” he said at last, “and, unfortunately, he likes better to talk than to work. I have heard a great deal about her. I think I know enough to say that she would not hope—anything that she had not been wooed and persuaded to believe in——”
“Then you think—you really suppose—you are so credulous, so optimist, so romantic,” cried the Signor with a crescendo of tone and gesticulation—“you think that a man of the world, a man of society, with no money, would marry—for love?”
The musician broke into a short laugh. “You should have heard them,” he added after a dramatic pause, “this very day whispering, chuchotéing, in my room while she was singing—talking—oh, don’t you know what about? About girls who marry rich men while (they say) their hearts are breaking for poor ones—about women using the most shameless arts to entrap a rich man, and even playing devotion to a woman with money; and the only one to be really pitied of all is the poor fellow, who has followed his heart, who is poor, who lives at Kew, and has two babies in a perambulator. I laugh at him myself,” said the Signor—“the fool, to give up his club and society because he took it into his silly head to love!”
“Rossinetti,” said the Minor Canon, “I know there are quantities of these wretched stories about; but human nature is human nature, after all, not the pitiful thing they make it out. I don’t believe they are true.”
“What! after all the newspapers—the new branch of literature that has sprung from them?” cried the Signor. Then he paused again and subsided. “I am of your opinion,” he said. “The fire would come down from heaven if it was true; but they believe it: that is the curious thing. You and I, we are not in society; we are charitable; we say human nature never was so bad as that; but they believe it. Rollo Ridsdale would be ashamed to behave like a man, as you and I would feel ourselves forced to behave, as my boy John is burning to do.”
“You and I.” The Minor Canon scarcely knew how it was that he repeated these words; they caught his ear and dropped from his lips before he was aware.
The Signor looked at him with a smile which was half satire and a little bit sympathy. He said, “That is what you are coming to, Ashford. I see it in your eye.”
“You are speaking—folly,” said Mr. Ashford; then he added hastily, “I have got one of my boys coming. I must go in.”
“Good-day,” said the other with his dark smile. He had penetrated the secret thoughts that had not as yet taken any definite form in his friend’s breast. Sometimes another eye sees more clearly than our own what is coming uppermost in our minds—or at least its owner believes so. The Signor was all the more likely to be right in this, that he had no belief in the calm sentiment of “interest” as actuating a man not yet too old for warmer feelings, in respect to a woman. He smiled sardonically at Platonic affection—as most people indeed do, unless the case is their own. He knew but one natural conclusion in such circumstances, and settled that it would be so without more ado. And such reasoning is sure in the majority of cases to be right, or to help to make itself right by the mere suggestion. To be sure he took an “interest”—a great interest—in Lottie himself; but that was in the way of art.
Mr. Ashford had no boy coming that he knew of when he said this to escape from the Signor; but, as sometimes happens, the expedient justified itself, and he had scarcely seated himself in his study when some one came up the oak staircase two or three steps at a time, and knocked at his door. In answer to the “Come in,” which was said with some impatience—for the Minor Canon had a great deal to think about, and had just decided to subject himself to a cross-examination—who should open the door but Law—Law, without any book under his arm, and with a countenance much more awake and alive than on the occasions when he carried that sign of study. “Can I speak to you?” Law said, casting a glance round the room to see that no one else was there. He came in half suspicious, but with serious meaning on his face. Then he came and placed himself in the chair which stood between Mr. Ashford’s writing-table and his bookcases. “I want to ask your advice,” he said.
“Well; I have done nothing else but give you my advice for some time past, Law.”
“Yes—to work—I know. You have given me a great deal of that sort of advice. What good is it, Mr. Ashford? I’ve gone on week after week, and what will it ever come to? Well, I know what you are going to say. I work, but I don’t work. I don’t care a bit about it. I haven’t got my heart in it. It is quite true. But you can’t change your disposition; you can’t change your nature. ”
“Stop a little, Law. So far as work is concerned you often can, if you will——”
“Ah, but there’s the rub,” said Law, looking his Mentor in the face. “I don’t want to—that is the simple fact. I don’t feel that I’ve the least desire to. I feel as if I won’t even when I know I ought. I think it’s more honest now at last to tell you the real truth.”
“I think I knew it pretty well some time ago,” said the Minor Canon with a smile. “It is a very common complaint. Even that can be got over with an effort. Indeed, I am glad you have found it out. Perhaps even, you know, it is not your brain at all but your will that is at fault.”
“Mr. Ashford,” said Law solemnly, “what is the good of talking? You know and I know that I never could make anything of it if I were to work, as we call it, till I was fifty. I never could pass any examination. They would be fools indeed if they let me in. I am no real good for anything like that. You know it well enough; why shouldn’t you say it? Here are you and me alone—nobody to overhear us, nobody to be vexed. What is the use of going on in the old way? I shall never do any good. You know it just as well as I.”
“Law,” said Mr. Ashford, “I will not contradict you. I believe you are right. If there was any other way of making your living I should say you were right. Books are not your natural tools; but they open the door to everything. The forest service, the telegraph service—all that sort of thing would suit you.”
At this point Law got up with excitement, and began walking up and down the room. “That is all very well,” he said. “Mr. Ashford, what is the use of deceiving ourselves? I shall never get into any of these. I’ve come to ask your advice once for all. I give up the books; I could only waste more time, and I’ve wasted too much already. It has come to this: I’ll emigrate or I’ll ’list. I don’t see how I’m to do that even, for I’ve no money—not enough to take me to London, let alone Australia. Why shouldn’t I do the other? It’s good enough; if there was a war it would be good enough. Even garrison duty I shouldn’t mind. It wouldn’t hurt my pride,” the lad said with a sudden flush of colour that belied his words; “and I might go away from here, so that it would not hurt her. That’s all, Mr. Ashford,” he said with suppressed feeling. “Only her—she’s the only one that cares; and if I went away from here she would never know.”
“Has anything happened to drive you to a decision at once? Is there anything new—anything——?”
“There is always something new,” said Law. “That woman has been to—to the only place I ever cared to go—to shut the door against me. They were her own friends too—at least people as good as—a great deal better than she. She has been there to bully them on my account, to say they are not to have me. Do you think I’ll stand that? What has she to do with me?”
“It must be a great deal worse for your sister, Law.”
“Well, isn’t that what I say? Do you think I can stand by and see Lottie bullied? Once she drove her out of the house. By Jove, if Lottie hadn’t come home I’d have killed her. I shouldn’t have stopped to think; I should have killed her,” said Law, whose own wrong had made him desperate. “Do you think I can stand by and see Lottie bullied by that woman? She’s brought it partly upon herself. She was too hard in the house with her management both upon the governor and me. She meant it well, but she was too hard. But still she’s Lottie, and I can’t see her put upon. Do you think I am made of stone,” cried Law indignantly, “or something worse than stone?”
“But if you were in Australia what better would she be? There you would certainly be of no use to her.”
Law was momentarily staggered, but he recovered himself. “She would know I was doing for myself, ” he said, “which might mean something for her, too, in time. I might send for her. At least,” said the lad, “she would not have me on her hands; she would only have herself to think of; and if she got on in her singing—the fact is, I can’t stand it, and one way or other I must get away.”
“What would you do if you were in Australia, Law?”
“Hang it all!” said the young man, tears of vexation and despite starting to his eyes, “a fellow must be good for something somewhere. You can’t be useless all round; I’m strong enough. And here’s one thing I’ve found out,” Law added with a laugh: “it doesn’t go against your pride to do things in the Colonies which you durstn’t do here. You can do—whatever you can do out there. It doesn’t matter being a gentleman. A gentleman can drive a cart or carry a load in Australia. That is the kind of place for me. I’d do whatever turned up.”
Said Mr. Ashford suddenly, “I know a man out there——” and then he paused. “Law, what would your sister do? There would be no one to stand by her. Even you, you have not much in your power, but you are always some one. You can give her a little sympathy. Even to feel that there are two of you must be something. ”
“Mr. Ashford,” said Law, “you will do her more good than I should. What have I been to poor Lottie? Only a trouble. Two of us—no; I can’t take even that to myself. I’ve worried her more than anything else. She would be the first to thank you. You know a man——?”
“I know a man,” said the Minor Canon—“I had forgotten him till now—a man who owes me a good turn; and I think he would pay it. If I were sure you would really do your best, and not forget the claims she has upon your kindness——”
“Would you like me to send for her as soon as I had a home for her?” Law asked with fervour. There was a subdued twinkle in his eye, but yet he was too much in earnest not to be ready to make any promise.
“That would be the right thing to do,” said the Minor Canon with excessive gravity, “though perhaps the bush is not exactly the kind of place to suit her. If you will promise to do your very best——”
“I will,” said the lad, “I will. I am desperate otherwise; you can see for yourself, Mr. Ashford. Give me only an opening; give me anything that I can work at. If I were to ’list I never should make much money by that. There’s only just this one thing,” said Law: “If I had a friend to go to, and a chance of employment, and would promise to pay it back, I suppose I might get a loan somewhere—a loan on good interest,” he continued, growing anxious and a little breathless—“perhaps from one of those societies, or some old money-lender, or something—to take me out?”
The Minor Canon laughed. “If this is what you are really set upon, and you will do your best,” he said, “I will see your father, and you need not trouble your mind about the interest. Perhaps we shall be able to manage that.”
“Oh, Mr. Ashford, what a good fellow you are! what a good friend you are!” cried Law, beaming with happiness. The tears once more came into his eyes, and then there came a glow of suppressed malice and fun behind that moisture. “Lottie will be more obliged even than I,” he said; “and I could send for her as soon as I got settled out there. ”