CHAPTER XXXVI.
THE HARE WITH MANY FRIENDS.
IT will be seen from all this that Mrs. Ford was but an indifferent guardian for an heiress. Her ideas of duty were of a peculiar kind. She had newly furnished the drawing-room. She had sweetbreads and other dainties for dinner. If Lucy had been fond of cake, or muffins, or buttered toast, she might have reveled in them; but it did not occur to the careful housekeeper to give herself much trouble about Lucy’s visitors. When Mrs. Rushton called, indeed, Mrs. Ford would sail into the room in her stiffest silk (which she kept spread out upon her bed, ready to put on at a moment’s notice) and take her part in the conversation; but she saw the young men come and go with the greatest indifference, and did not disturb herself out of her usual habits for them. Though she entertained the worst suspicions in respect to Mrs. Stone’s motives, she did not object to St. Clair, neither did she dislike Raymond Rushton, though she saw through (as she thought) all his mother’s devices. We will not attempt to explain this entirely feminine reasoning. It was the reasoning of a woman on a lower level of society than that which considers chaperons necessary. She saw no harm in St. Clair’s appearance in the morning to teach Jock, though Lucy, not much better instructed than Mrs. Ford, was always present at the lessons, and profited too in a mild way. Mr. St. Clair came every morning, turning the pink drawing-room into a school room, and pursuing his work with so much conscience that Lucy herself began to learn a little Latin by listening to Jock’s perpetual repetitions. She was very anxious that Jock should learn, and consented to hear all the story about the gentleman and the windmills, in order to bribe him. “I think he must have been cracked all the same,” Lucy said. “Oh, I don’t say, dear, that he was not a very nice gentleman; and after you have learned your lessons, you can tell me a little more.” Mr. St. Clair made himself of great use to Lucy too. He brought, her books in which she could read her history at much less cost than in her dry text-books: and helped her on in a way for which she was unfeignedly grateful. And after the intercourse of the morning there was the meeting afforded by that evening stroll in the half light after tea, which Jock considered his due. Mrs. Stone too loved that evening hour, and the soft dusk and rising starlight, and was always to be found on the common with her light Shetland shawl over her handsome head, under the dutiful escort of her nephew. The two little parties always joined company, and a great deal of instructive conversation went on. On one of these evenings, Lucy had been waylaid by a poor creature with a pitiful story which went to the girl’s heart. It had already become known in Farafield that there was in the Terrace a young lady who had a great deal of ready money, and a very soft heart.
“Who was that woman, Lucy?” said Mrs. Stone, as they met at the door of the White House. They had been standing there, waiting for her, aunt and nephew both, watching for her coming. “I suppose she was a beggar; but you must take care not to give too much in that way, or to get yourself a reputation among them; you will be taken in on every side, and it will vex you to be deceived.”
“Yes,” said Lucy, simply. “It would vex me very much, more than anything else I can think of. I would rather be beaten than deceived.”
This made Mrs. Stone wince for a moment, till she reflected that she had no intention of deceiving Lucy, but, in reality, was trying to bring about the very best thing for her, the object of every girl’s hopes.
“Then who was this woman?” she said.
“Indeed, I did not ask her name. She was—sent to me. What do you think is right?” said Lucy, “to give people money, or a little pension, or—”
“A little pension, my dear child! a woman you know nothing about. No, no, give me her name, and I will have her case inquired into, and if she is deserving—”
“I don’t think it is anybody that is deserving, Mrs. Stone.”
“Lucy! my dear, you must not—you really must not, act in this independent way. What do you know about human nature? Nobody who is not deserving should be allowed to come near a child of your age.”
St. Clair laughed. “That might cut a great many ways,” he said. “Perhaps, in that case, you would have to banish most of the people Miss Trevor is in the habit of seeing.”
“You, for example.”
“That was what I was about to suggest,” he said, folding his hands with an air of great humility. This beguiled Lucy into a smile, as it was meant to do; and yet there was a certain sincerity in it—a sincerity which seemed somehow to make up for, and to justify in the culprit’s own eye, a good deal of deceit; though, indeed, St. Clair said to himself, like his aunt, that he was using no deceit; he was trying to get the love of a good and nice girl, one who would make an excellent wife; and what more entirely warrantable, lawful, laudable action could a young man do?
“You are making fun,” said Lucy, “but I am in great earnest. Papa, in his will, ordered me to give away a great deal of money. He did not say anything about deserving: and if people are in great want, in need—is it not as hard, almost worse, for the bad people than for the good?”
“My dear, that is very unsafe, very dangerous doctrine. In this way you would reward the bad for having ruined themselves.”
“Or make up to them,” said St. Clair, “a little—as much as any one can make up for that greatest of misfortunes—for being bad.”
Lucy looked from one to another, bewildered, not knowing which to follow.
“Yes, it is the greatest of all misfortunes; but still that is sophistry; that argument is all wrong. If the good and the bad got just the same, why should any one be good?”
“Oh!” said Lucy, with a heave of her breast; but though her heart rose and the color came to her cheeks, she had not sufficient power of language to communicate her sentiments, and she was grateful to St. Clair, who interposed.
“Do you think,” he said, “that any one is good, as you say, for what he gets? One is good because one can’t help it—or for the pleasure of it—or to please some one else if it does not please one’s self.”
“For shame, Frank, you take all the merit out of goodness,” his aunt said.
“Oh, no!” Lucy breathed out of the bottom of her heart. She could not argue, but her soft eyes turned upon St. Clair with gratitude. Perhaps he was not quite right either, but he was far more right than Mrs. Stone.
“Miss Trevor agrees with me,” he said quietly, as if that settled the question; and Lucy would not have been human had she not been gratified, and flattered, and happy. She looked at him with a silent glow of thanks in her eyes, even though in her heart she felt a slight rising of ridicule, as if it could matter whether she agreed or not!
“This is all very fine,” said Mrs. Stone, “but practically it remains certain that the people who merit your kindness are those to whom you ought to give it, Lucy. I did not know your father had left instructions about your charities.”
“He did not quite mean charities,” said Lucy; “it was that I should help people who wanted help. He thought we—owed it, having so much: and I think so too.”
“And therefore you were meditating a pension to the first beggar that came in your way. My dear child! you will be eaten up by beggars if you begin with this wild liberality.”
“It was not exactly—a beggar; it is not that I mean.”
“I will tell you what to do,” said Mrs. Stone, “take the names of the people who apply to you, and bring them to me. I will have the cases thoroughly sifted. We have really a very good organization for all that kind of thing in Farafield, and I promise you, Lucy, that if there is any very hard case, or circumstances which are very pitiful, even though the applicant be not quite deserving, you shall decide for yourself and give if you wish to give; but do let them be sifted first.”
Lucy said nothing; to have “cases” which should be “sifted” by Mrs. Stone, did not seem at all to correspond with her instructions; and again it was St. Clair who came to her aid.
“The holidays are very nearly over,” he said, “and we have a little problem of our own to settle. Do you know, Miss Trevor, my aunt meditates sending me away.”
“Oh!” cried Lucy, with alarm. She turned instinctively to Jock, who was roaming about the common before them. “But what should we do then?” she said, with simplicity. The guardians had not yet interfered about Jock’s training; they had left the little fellow in her hands; and Lucy was very much solaced and comforted by the arrangement in respect to her little brother which St. Clair’s delicate health had permitted her to make.
“You forget that I am a wolf in sheep’s clothing. I am a ravening lion, seeking whom I may devour. I am an enemy in the camp.”
“Is that all because he is a gentleman?” said Lucy to Mrs. Stone, with wondering eyes.
It was not Mrs. Stone who replied, but Miss Southwood, who had now come out to join them, and who had heard St. Clair’s description of himself. She nodded her head, upon which was a close “cottage bonnet” of the fashion of thirty years ago.
“Yes, yes,” she said, “it is quite out of the question, it is not to be permitted; not one of the parents would consent to it if they knew.”
“The parents do not trouble me much,” Mrs. Stone said, raising her head; “when I think a thing is right, I laugh at parents. They are perfectly free to take the girls away, if they object; I judge for myself.”
“But you must not laugh at parents,” said the timid sister. “Maria! you make me shiver. I don’t like you to say it even on the common, where there is nobody to hear. There is that child with his big eyes; he might come out with it in any society. Laugh at—parents! You might as well say you don’t believe in the— British Constitution, or the— Reformation, or—even the House of Commons or the Peerage,” Miss Southwood said hurriedly, by way of epitomizing everything that is sacred.
“The Reformation is quite out of fashion, it is vulgar to profess any relief in that; and at all times,” said Mrs. Stone, “popular institutions are to be treated with incredulity, and popular fallacies with contempt. Frank is not a ravening lion, he wants to devour nobody but— Jock. Yes, when you do bad exercises he would like to swallow you at one gulp.”
“Is he going away?” said Jock, whom this reference to himself had roused to attention. Then he said with authority, “He had better come and live with us, there’s a spare room; Lucy wants him as much as me. I know there is something she wants, for she looks at him when nobody is noticing, like this—” And Jock gave such an imitation of Lucy’s look as was possible to him.
This strange speech made an extraordinary commotion in the quiet group. The two sisters and St. Clair sent each other rapid telegraphic messages by some kind of electricity, which went through them all. It was one look of wonder, satisfaction, consternation, delight that flashed from one pair of eyes to the other, and brought a sudden suffusion to all their faces. As for Lucy, she took it a great deal more quietly. They had the look of having made a discovery, but she did not betray the consciousness of one who has been found out.
“Indeed, I hope Mr. St. Clair will stay, I don’t think it would make any difference to the girls,” she said; and then she added, with a little excitement, “How strange it will be to see them all back again, and me so different!”
Grammar had never been Lucy’s strong point.
“Shouldn’t you like to come back?”
Lucy laughed and shook her head.
“I can’t tell,” she said. “I should—and yet how could I? I am so different. And by and by I should have to go away again. How strange it is that in such a little time, that has been nothing to them, so much should have happened to me.”
There passed rapidly through Lucy’s mind as she spoke a review of the circumstances and people who had furnished her with so many varied experiences. First and greatest stood the Randolphs, and that other world of life in London, which she knew was waiting for her in the shut-up rooms, all shutters and brown-holland, in Lady Randolph’s house. She seemed to see these rooms, closed and dim, with rays of light coming in through the crevices, and everything covered up, in which her life was awaiting her. The other scenes flitted across her mind like shadows, the episode of the Russells, the facts of her present existence—all shadows; but Grosvenor Street was real, though all the shutters were shut. While this was passing through her mind, the others were giving her credit for visions very different. They glanced at each other again, and Mrs. Stone took her nephew’s arm and gave it a significant pressure. She was too much elated to be capable of much talk.
“We must see Lucy home,” she said. “It is getting late, and dear little Jock ought to be in bed. I am always glad to see my girls come back; but there is one thing I shall grudge, these evening strolls; they have been very sweet.”
“Then you have made up your mind, notwithstanding Miss Trevor’s intercession (for which I thank her on my knees), to send me away?”
“I can not send you away while you are necessary to the comfort of—these dear children,” Mrs. Stone said. There was a little break of emotion in her voice, and Lucy listened with some surprise. She was scarcely aware that she had interceded, yet in reality she was very glad that Mr. St. Clair should stay. She observed that he held her hand a moment longer than was necessary, as he bade her good-night, but she did not attach any meaning to this. It was an accident; she was too greatly indifferent to notice it at all.
And thus the tranquil days went on; the girls came back, but Mr. St. Clair did not go away. He was faithful to Jock and his lessons, and very sympathetic and kind to Lucy, though he did not at all understand the semi-abstraction into which she sometimes fell in his presence, and which was due to her anxious self-inquiries how she could propound to him the question of permanent help. Indeed this abstraction deceived St. Clair as much as his devotion was intended to deceive her. He was taken in his own toils, or, rather, he fell into the trap which little Jock had innocently laid for him. When Lucy looked at him, he thought that he could see the keen interest which the child had discovered in her eyes; and when she did not look at him, he thought she was averting her eyes in maiden bashfulness for fear of betraying herself; and he permitted himself to watch her with more and more tender and close observation. He was far cleverer and more experienced than Lucy, but her simplicity deceived him; and as he gave Jock his lesson and watched the tranquil figure of the girl sitting by, St. Clair felt, with a throb of excitement, that he was approaching a sort of fabulous termination, a success more great than anything he had ever actually believed in. For, as a matter of fact, he had never really believed in this chance which his aunt had set before him. He had “gone in for” Lucy as he would have “gone in for” any other temporary pursuit which furnished him with something to do, and satisfied the relatives on whom he was more dependent than was agreeable. But now suddenly the chase had become real, the chance a possibility, or more than a possibility. In such circumstances, what suitor could avoid a growing excitement? The moment the thing became possible, it became wildly exciting, a hurrying pursuit, a breathless effort. Thus while Lucy’s thoughts were gravely fixed upon what she considered the chief business of her life, St. Clair, on his side, pursued the object of his with an ardor which increased as the end of the pursuit seemed to draw near. His voice took tender inflections, his eyes gave forth glowing glances, his aspect became more and more that of a lover; but Lucy, preoccupied and inexperienced, saw nothing of this, and there was no one else to divine what the unlucky wooer meant, unless, indeed it might be Jock, who saw and heard so much more than any one supposed, so much more than he himself knew.
Side by side along with this pursuit was that of which Mrs. Ford more clearly perceived the danger, the wooing of Mrs. Rushton and her son Ray. Mrs. Ford’s instinct was just, it was the mother who was the more dangerous of the two. Ray, with his hands in his pockets, did not present much of the natural appearance of a hero, and he had still less of the energy and spontaneousness of a successful lover than he had of the appearance which wins or breaks hearts, but, nevertheless, by dint of unwearied exertions, he was kept more or less up to the mark. Lucy had another constant visitor, about whose “intentions” it was less easy to pronounce. Philip Rainy began to come very often to the Terrace; he scorned Ray Rushton, and he paid the compliment of a hearty dislike to St. Clair, he was suspicious of both, and of all others who appeared in the neighborhood; but this was in the true spirit of the dog in the manger, for his own purposes were more confused than ever, and he had no desire to make any effort to appropriate to himself the great prize. He stood by and looked on in a state of jealous watchfulness, sometimes launching a word of bitter criticism against his cousin; but unable to force himself to enter the lists, or take a single step to obtain what he could not make up his mind to resign. Sometimes Katie Russell would be with her friend, and then the young school-master went through such tumults of feeling as nobody had thought him capable of. He was the only one that had any struggle in his mind; but his was a hard one. Love or advantage, which was it to be? By this time it was very clear to him that they had no chance to be united in his case.
It was now October, but the weather was still warm, and it was still possible to play croquet on the lawn, amid an increased party of young people, the only kind of dissipation which Lucy’s mourning made practicable. Mrs. Rushton’s regrets were great that a dance was not possible, but she knew better than to attempt such a thing, and set all the gossips going. “Next year everything will be very different,” she said, “unless in the meantime some fairy prince comes and carries our Lucy away.”
“I am her guardian, and I will have nothing to say to any fairy prince,” Mr. Rushton said. They both gave a glance at their son as they spoke, who was a good-looking young fellow enough, but not much like a Prince Charmant. And Lucy smiled and accepted the joke quite calmly, knowing nothing of any such hero. She heard all his mother’s praise of Raymond quite unmoved, saying “Indeed,” and “That was very nice;” but without the faintest gleam of emotion. It was very provoking. Mrs. Rushton had made up her mind that Lucy was not a girl of much feeling, but yet would be insensibly moved by habits of association, and by finding one person always at her elbow wherever she moved. Raymond, in the meantime, had profited in a way beyond his hopes. He had got a horse, the better to accompany the heiress on her rides, and his money in his pocket was more abundant; but when his mother spurred him up to a greater display of devotion, the young man complained that he had not encouragement. “Encouragement!” Mrs. Rushton cried; “a girl with no one can tell how many thousands a year, and you want encouragement!” It seemed to her preposterous. Oh, that mothers could but do for sons what they are so lukewarm in doing for themselves! Mrs. Rushton did all that was possible. She told tales of her boy’s courage and unselfishness, which were enough to have dazzled any girl, and hinted and insinuated his bashful love in a hundred delicate ways. But Lucy remained obtuse to everything. She was not clever nor had she much imagination, and love had not yet acquired any place in her thoughts.
This was to be the last croquet-party of the season, and all that was fair and fashionable and eligible in Farafield was gathered on the lawn, round which the scarlet geraniums were blazing like a gorgeous border to a great shawl. Rarely had Lucy seen so gay a scene. When she had herself got through a game, which she did not particularly care for, she was allowed to place herself in one of the low basket-chairs near the tea-table, at which Mrs. Rushton was always seated. “Was there ever such a child?” Mrs. Rushton said; “she prefers to sit with us dowagers rather than to take her share in the game.”
“And what is still more wonderful,” said an old lady, who perhaps did not care to hear herself called a dowager, “your son Raymond seems of the same opinion, though he is a hot croquet-player, as we all know.”
“Oh, Ray; I hope he is too civil to think what he likes himself,” his mother said, with well-assumed carelessness. But this did not take anybody in. And all the elder people watched the heiress, as indeed the younger ones did also in the midst of their game; for though Lucy did not greatly care for his attendance, there were some who prized Ray, and to whom his post at her elbow was very distasteful. He was very faithful to that post on this occasion, for St. Clair had posted himself on Lucy’s other hand, and Raymond’s energies were quickened by opposition.
“Why does not Miss Trevor play croquet?” St. Clair said.
“I have been playing; but it is prettier to look on,” said Lucy; “and I am not at all good. I have never been good at any game.”
“You are quite good enough for me, Miss Trevor,” said Ray. “I never can get on with your fine players, who expect you to study it; now Walford does study it. He gets up in the morning and practices.”
“Mr. Walford is a clergyman, it is part of his duty,” said St. Clair. “A layman has a great many exemptions. He may wear colored ties, and he need not play croquet—unless he likes.” Now Raymond had a blue tie, which was generally considered very becoming to him.
“Do you remember the day we had at the old abbey?” said Ray. “I wonder if we could do that again this season. It was very jolly. Don’t you think we might try it again, Miss Trevor? The ruins are all covered with that red stuff that looks so nice in the autumn; and I hear Mayflower is all right again this morning. I went to the stable to ask. I thought as sure as fate she had got a strain; I had a long talk with Simpson about her.”
“It was very kind of you, Mr. Rushton.”
“Oh, not at all kind—but you can’t think I should not be interested in Mayflower. If she did not carry you so nicely even, she’s a beauty in herself. And she does carry you beautifully—or rather it’s you, Miss Trevor, that—”
“Yes,” said St. Clair, “that is how I would put it. It is you, Miss Trevor, who witch the world with such noble horsemanship that any animal becomes a beauty. That is the right way to put it.”
“But there is no noble horsemanship in my case,” Lucy said with a smile.
“Oh, come, I don’t know that,” cried Ray; “if it comes to circus tricks that wouldn’t answer for a lady; but there aren’t many better riders than you, Miss Trevor. You don’t make any show, but you sit your mare as if you were cut out of one piece, you and she.”
“That is quite a poetical description,” St. Clair said. “Why am I only a pedestrian, while you two canter by? You cover me with dust, and my heart with ashes and bitterness when you pass me on the road. Why is one man carried along on the top of the wave, in the most desirable company, while another trudges along in the dust all by himself? Your ride opens all the problems of life, Miss Trevor, to the poor wretch you pass on the way.”
Lucy looked at him wistfully. It was the look which Jock had described, and it moved St. Clair greatly, but yet he did not know what meaning was in her eyes. Mrs. Rushton saw it too, and it seemed to her that St. Clair was getting the best of it. She called to him suddenly, and he left his post with great reluctance. He had more to say than they had, he had more experience altogether; and it was not to subject the heiress to the seductions of Mrs. Stone’s nephew that Mrs. Rushton had asked him here.
“Don’t you play?” she said; “they are just looking for some one to make up the game. It would be so kind of you to join them. I know they are rather young for you, Mr. St. Clair, but it would be all the more kind if you were to play.”
“It would be too kind,” he said; he had all his wits about him; “they do not care for grandfathers like myself. Let me look on as becomes my years, or, better still, let me help you. There must be some lady of my own standing who wants to be helped to some tea.”
“You are too quick for me,” she said; “you know that is not what I mean; you must not stay among the dowagers. The girls would never forgive me if I kept all the best men here.”
“Ah, is that so?” he said. “But we are making ourselves very useful. Your son is taking charge of Miss Trevor, who is a very important person, and requires a great deal of attention, and I am handing the cake. Mrs. Walford, you will surely take some; I am charged to point out to you how excellent it is.”
“It is too good for me,” said the old lady whom he addressed, shaking all the flowers on her bonnet. She was the curate’s mother, and she thought it her duty to back her hostess up. “You should not mind us, Mr. St. Clair; the girls will be quite jealous if they see all the young men handing cake.”
“Then I must take it to Miss Trevor,” St. Clair said.
Meanwhile Ray was taking advantage of his opportunity. “Won’t you come for a turn, Miss Trevor? Some fellows are so pushing they never know when they are wanted. Do come if it was just to give him the slip. Why should he be always hanging on here? Why ain’t he doing something? If a fellow is out in the world, he ought to stay out in the world, not come poking about here.”
“He is not strong, he is not well enough for his profession,” Lucy said.
“Oh, that is bosh. I beg your pardon, Miss Trevor, but only look at him, he is fat. If he is not strong it is the more shame for him, it is because he has let himself get out of training,” Ray said.
Lucy glanced at St. Clair with the cake in his hand, and a very small laugh came from her. She could not restrain it altogether, but she was ashamed of it. He was fat. He was more handsome than Ray, and a great deal more amusing; and he had an interest to her besides which no one understood. She could not dismiss from her mind the idea that he was a man to be helped, and yet she could not but laugh, though with a compunction. A man who can be called fat appeals to no one’s sympathies. She had got up rather reluctantly on Raymond’s invitation, but he had not succeeded in drawing her attention to himself. She was still standing in the same place when St. Clair hastened back.
“You are going round the grounds,” he said, “à la bonne heure take me with you, please, and save me from croquet. I don’t know the mysteries of the labyrinths, the full extent of Mr. Rushton’s grounds.”
“Oh, there is no labyrinth,” Lucy said.
“And there are no mysteries,” cried Ray, indignantly; three people walking solemnly along a garden-path abreast is poor fun.
“Didn’t my mother put croquet on the card?” he added; “it is always for croquet the people are asked. It is a pity you don’t like it.” Ray wanted very much to be rude, but he was better than his temper, and did not know how to carry out his intention.
“Isn’t it?” said St. Clair coolly; “a thousand pities. I am always getting into trouble in consequence, but what can I do, Miss Trevor? I hate croquet. It is plus fort que moi; and you do not like it either?”
“Not very much,” Lucy answered, and she moved along somewhat timidly between the two men who kept one on each side of her. Raymond did not say much. It was he who had brought her away, who had suggested “a turn,” but it was this fellow who was getting the good of it. Ray’s heart was very hot with indignation, but his inventive powers were not great, and in his anger he could not find a word to say.
“It is a peculiarity of society in England that we can not meet save on some practical pretence or other. Abroad,” said St. Clair, with all the confidence of a man who has traveled, “conversation is always reason enough. After all, it is a talk we want, not games. We want to know each other better, to become better friends; that is the object of all social gatherings. The French understand all these things so much better than we.”
This the two young people beside him listened to with awe, neither of them having ever set foot on foreign soil.
“For my part,” cried Ray, suddenly, “I don’t see the good of that constant chattering. Far better do something than to be forever talk—talking. It may suit the French, who ain’t good for much else; but we want something more over here. Besides, what can you talk about?” the young man went on; “things can’t happen just to give you a subject, and when you have said it’s a fine day, and what a nice party that was at the Smiths, what more have you got to say?”
“I quite agree with you,” said St. Clair; “when you have no more than that to say it is a great deal better to play at something. But yet conversation has its advantages. Miss Trevor, here is one last rose. It is the last that will come out this season. Oh, yes, there are plenty of buds, but they are belated, they will never get to be roses. There will come a frost to-night and slay them all in their nests, in their cradles. This one is all the sweeter for being on the edge of ruin. I will gather it for you. A flower,” he said, in a low tone, which Ray could only half hear, “is all a poor man can offer at any shrine.” Raymond looked on, crimson with indignation. It was on his lips to bid this interloper offer what belonged to himself, not a flower out of another man’s garden; but when St. Clair tore his finger on a thorn, the real proprietor of the rose was enchanted; but even this the fellow managed to turn to his own advantage. “It has cost me more than I thought,” he said, so low that this time Ray could not hear anything but a murmur. “It is symbolical, I would give all that is in my