CHAPTER XII. — FERNBOROUGH HALL
Fernborough Hall,—not a hall in the town of Fernborough in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, but a rambling, old-fashioned brick building in the County of Sussex in “Merrie England;” a stately home set in the middle of hundreds of acres of upland, lowland, and woodland. Wings had been added as required, and a tower from which, on a clear day, the English Channel could be seen with the naked eye, while a field-glass brought into view the myriad craft, bound east and west, north and south, on the peaceful missions of trade.
There was no terrace upon which gaudy peacocks strutted back and forth, but in front of the Hall was a small artificial lake in which some transplanted fish led the lives of prisoners. Lady Fernborough begged the Baronet to end their miserable existence, but, to him, innovation was folly and destruction bordered on criminality.
“When I am gone, Ella,” he would say, “you may introduce your American ideas, for everything will be yours. When the Fernborough name dies, let the fish die too.”
The long search for his lost daughter had made him misanthropic. His knowledge of her sad death had been accompanied, it is true, by the pleasing intelligence that his daughter's child lived, but that grand-daughter, though of his blood and British born, had not been educated according to British ideas. To be sure, she was now a Countess, but she had been transplanted to her native soil, and had not grown there.
It might be asked, if he was so insular in his ideas, why had he taken an American wife, and she a widow? He had been charmed by her vivacity. She lifted him out of the gloom in which he had lived so long. If she had been tame and prosaic, she would have worn the weeds of widowhood again in a short time. She made him comfortable; she surrounded him with the brightest people she could find; he was not allowed to mope indoors, and Sir Stuart Fernborough and his sprightly American wife attended all the important social functions of the County, and many in London, and at the houses of their friends. And now a great joy was to come to Lady Fernborough. She expected visitors from the United States, and what she considered needful preparations kept her in a flutter of excitement.
“How soon do you expect them?” asked Sir Stuart at breakfast.
“To-morrow, or next day. They sailed on the tenth; to-morrow is the seventeenth, but they may rest for a day in Liverpool—”
“Or stay a day or two in London,” suggested Sir Stuart.
“I hope not, for my guests will be impatient to see a real live American ex-governor. Quincy's political advancement has been very rapid.”
“America is a rapid country, my dear,” was Sir Stuart's comment.
When Lady Fernborough reached her boudoir, she seated herself at her writing desk and wrote rapidly for nearly an hour.
“I don't wish too many guests,” she soliloquized as she sealed the last invitation. “Now, I must write to Linda.”
“My dear Linda,
“I have a great surprise for you. You must forgive me for keeping a secret. I do it so seldom, I wished the experience. I am like the penniless suitor who proposed to an heiress, who, he knew, would reject him, just to see how it would make him feel to lose a fortune. I think I saw that in Punch, but it fits my case exactly. They will be here, sure, day after to-morrow. I mean Quincy and Alice, and, I hope, Maude. Come and bring all the children. I suppose Algernon is in London helping to make laws for unruly Britishers, but we will make merry and defy the constables. Despite my marital patronymic, and my armorial bearings, I am still, your loving aunt Ella.”
Alice was not to tell the sad news to Lady Fernborough. The telegraph outstrips the ocean liner, and a newspaper, with tidings of the great calamity, was in Aunt Ella's hands long before the arrival of the broken-hearted wife and disconsolate sister. The invitations were countermanded, and days of sorrow followed instead of the anticipated time of joyfulness.
Alice and Florence told the story of the tragedy over and over again to sympathizing listeners.
“That was just like Quincy to give his place to that poor woman and her child,” said Aunt Ella. “Like Bayard he was without fear and he died without reproach.”
Alice would not abandon hope. She racked her brain for possibilities and probabilities. Perhaps there had been another boat in which her husband and the Captain escaped. They might have been discovered and rescued by some vessel bound to America, or, perhaps, some faraway foreign country. He would let them know as soon as he reached land.
Aunt Ella, though naturally optimistic, did not, in her own heart, share Alice's hopeful anticipations. Perhaps Florence's somewhat extravagant account of the collision and the events which followed it led her to form the opinion that her nephew's escape from death was impossible.
Hope takes good root, but it is a flower that, too often, has no blossom. A month passed—two—three—four—five—six—and then despair filled the young wife's heart. She could bear up no longer, and Dr. Parshefield made frequent visits.
Aunt Ella pressed the fatherless infant to her breast.
“What shall you name him, Alice?”
“There can be but one name for him. God sent us two little girls, but took them back again. We both wished for a son, and Heaven has sent one, but has taken the father from us.”
“And you will name him—”
“Quincy Adams Sawyer, Junior,” was the answer. “It is his birthright.”
“But,” said Aunt Ella, “they never add Junior to a boy's name unless his father is living.”
Alice sat up in bed, and her eyes flashed as she said,
“My heart has renewed its hope with this young life. I believe my husband still lives, and, until I have conclusive proofs of his death, our son's name will be Quincy Adams Sawyer, Junior.”