So the father took his old place,and looked round on the remnant of his children,grave indeed,but not weighed down by incurable suffering.Something,deeper even than the hard time he had recently passed through,seemed to have made his home more than ever dear to him.He sat in his arm-chair,never weary of noticing everything pleasant about him,of saying how pretty Beechwood looked,and how delicious it was to be at home.And perpetually,if any chance unlinked it,his hand would return to its clasp of Ursula's;the minute she left her place by his side,his restless "Love,where are you going?"would call her back again.And once,when the children were out of the room,and I,sitting in a dark corner,was probably thought absent likewise,I saw John take his wife's face between his two hands,and look in it--the fondest,most lingering,saddest look!--then fold her tightly to his breast.
"I must never be away from her again.Mine--for as long as I live,mine--MY wife,MY Ursula!"She took it all naturally,as she had taken every expression of his love these nine-and-twenty years.I left them,standing eye to eye,heart to heart,as if nothing in this world could ever part them.
Next morning was as gay as any of our mornings used to be,for,before breakfast,came Edwin and Louise.And after breakfast,the father and mother and I walked up and down the garden for an hour,talking over the prospects of the young couple.Then the post came--but we had no need to watch for it now.It only brought a letter from Lord Ravenel.
John read it,somewhat more seriously than he had been used to read these letters--which for the last year or so had come often enough--the boys usually quizzing,and Mistress Maud vehemently defending,the delicate small hand-writing,the exquisite paper,the coronetted seal,and the frank in the corner.John liked to have them,and his wife also--she being not indifferent to the fact,confirmed by many other facts,that if there was one man in the world whom Lord Ravenel honoured and admired,it was John Halifax of Beechwood.But this time her pleasure was apparently damped;and when Maud,claiming the letter as usual,spread abroad,delightedly,the news that "her"Lord Ravenel was coming shortly,I imagined this visit was not so welcome as usual to the parents.
Yet still,as many a time before,when Mr.Halifax closed the letter,he sighed,looked sorrowful,saying only,"Poor Lord Ravenel!""John,"asked his wife,speaking in a whisper,for by tacit consent all public allusion to his doings at Paris was avoided in the family--"did you,by any chance,hear anything of--You know whom I mean?""Not one syllable."
"You inquired?"He assented."I knew you would.She must be almost an old woman now,or perhaps she is dead.Poor Caroline!"It was the first time for years and years that this name had been breathed in our household.Involuntarily it carried me back--perhaps others besides me--to the day at Longfield when little Guy had devoted himself to his "pretty lady;"when we first heard that other name,which by a curious conjuncture of circumstances had since become so fatally familiar,and which would henceforward be like the sound of a death-bell in our family--Gerard Vermilye.
On Lord Ravenel's re-appearance at Beechwood--and he seemed eager and glad to come--I was tempted to wish him away.He never crossed the threshold but his presence brought a shadow over the parents'looks--and no wonder.The young people were gay and friendly as ever;made him always welcome with us;and he rode over daily from desolate,long-uninhabited Luxmore,where,in all its desolation,he appeared so fond of abiding.
He wanted to take Maud and Walter over there one day,to see some magnificent firs that were being cut down in a wholesale massacre,leaving the grand old Hall as bare as a workhouse front.But the father objected;he was clearly determined that all the hospitalities between Luxmore and Beechwood should be on the Beechwood side.
Lord Ravenel apparently perceived this."Luxmore is not Compiegne,"he said to me,with his dreary smile,half-sad,half-cynical."Mr.
Halifax might indulge me with the society of his children."And as he lay on the grass--it was full summer now--watching Maud's white dress flit about under the trees,I saw,or fancied I saw,something different to any former expression that had ever lighted up the soft languid mien of William Lord Ravenel.
"How tall that child has grown lately!She is about nineteen,Ithink?"
"Not seventeen till December."
"Ah,so young?--Well,it is pleasant to be young!--Dear little Maud!"He turned on one side,hiding the sun from his eyes with those delicate ringed hands--which many a time our boys had laughed at,saying they were mere lady's hands,fit for no work at all.
Perhaps Lord Ravenel felt the cloud that had come over our intercourse with him;a cloud which,considering late events,was scarcely unnatural:for when evening came,his leave-taking,always a regret,seemed now as painful as his blase indifference to all emotions,pleasant or unpleasant,could allow.He lingered--he hesitated--he repeated many times how glad he should be to see Beechwood again;how all the world was to him "flat,stale,and unprofitable,"except Beechwood.
John made no special answer;except that frank smile not without a certain kindly satire,under which the young nobleman's Byronic affectations generally melted away like mists in the morning.He kindled up into warmth and manliness.
"I thank you,Mr.Halifax--I thank you heartily for all you and your household have been to me.I trust I shall enjoy your friendship for many years.And if,in any way,I might offer mine,or any small influence in the world--""Your influence is not small,"John returned earnestly."I have often told you so.I know no man who has wider opportunities than you have.""But I have let them slip--for ever."