THE SECRET MARRIAGE.
In famous old Cornwall, known as "the Land of Tin," in the days of Solomon—the land of Druid Cromlechs and Celtic circles, of those mysterious sarcophagi named Kistvaens, wherein lie the bones of a race unknown—the land of many wondrous relics of a vanished past, lies the scene of the following events.
Not far from that part of the coast which is washed by the British Channel stands Restormel Court, at the time of our story—a few years ago—the seat of Sir Launcelot Tredegarth Tresilian, Bart., a proud old gentleman, whose chief, if not only failing was an inordinate pride of family; and hence whose principal regret was, that though he had heirs to succeed him in his estate, there was none to follow him in his title, which had been bestowed upon him by the late King William IV. for certain political services. His two sons had been killed in the service of the country. One had fallen in Central India and the other in the Crimea, and as the baronetcy was limited by diploma "to the heirs male of his own body," he had to rest him content with the knowledge that he was the first and last baronet of Restormel Court.
Occupying the site of a castle demolished by the French when they landed in Cornwall during the reign of Henry VI., the latter is an edifice much older than it looks.
The whole house was an epitome of the past; trophies of war and the chase—coats of mail and stags' horns—decorated the hall, and some of the rooms had remained untouched since the days of the "Virgin Queen," hung with tapestry, which was lifted to give entrance; hearths intended for wood alone, and andirons—heraldic griffins—to support the logs; and there were curious cabinets, Cromwellian chairs, and carved prie-Dieu of all kinds.
On one evening in autumn, the present lord of Restormel Court was lingering over his wine—some choice old Madeira, which had been carefully iced for him by the butler—in company with his two nephews, the eldest of whom was understood to be, and acknowledged by himself and all, as his future heir.
Sir Launcelot, verging then on his eightieth year, was a pale, thin, and wasted-looking man. He was toying with his wine-glass, and from time to time contemplating his wasted white hands, on each of which a diamond glittered; and then he looked at his nephews, who were intently conversing near the fire.
They were both men about thirty-eight and forty years of age respectively. Arthur Tresilian, the eldest, and ever the prime favourite, was remarkably handsome, with fine, regular features.
His brother, Basset Tresilian, who followed the legal profession with success in London, was less athletic, but quite as striking in figure.
Somehow people, especially in Cornwall, did not like Mr. Basset Tresilian; and his periodical visits to the Court added no brightness to the circle usually to be met there.
"Well, boys" (for though men, the old baronet, by force of habit, called them boys still), "fill your glasses, and don't leave me to drink alone. Egad! in my time fellows didn't shirk their wine as you do; but it is all cigars and odious pipes now. Well, Basset, what does he say? Is he inclined to follow the example you so boldly set him some sixteen years ago, and take unto himself a wife?"
"I cannot say, sir. It is of a horse we were talking."
"A horse—pshaw! You were wise to marry young, Basset. I did so!" said Sir Launcelot.
"I have had no reason to repent me thereof," replied Basset, complacently. "My family are charming; Mona is a fine girl in face and figure."
"Quite a Tresilian—eh?" said the old man, proudly.
"And your nephew, Lance, is as handsome a boy as any in London. I have, indeed, prospered every day since I placed the marriage hoop on Marion's finger."
"Egad! you sing your own praises well, nephew Basset," said the baronet, after a pause. "But you, Arthur—why have you not imitated this fine example? I cannot last for ever, and I don't want my estates to go begging for owners."
Arthur coloured with too evident vexation.
"They cannot beg far, dear uncle," he replied, "while I have the good fortune to be your heir; and, then, Basset——"
"His sons, you would say?"
"Yes," replied the other, with a faint voice; for Basset was regarding him so keenly that he felt his colour deepen.
"What is the booby blushing for?" asked Sir Launcelot, laughing. "Blushing at forty! By Jove! I was cured of it at fourteen! Will you ride with—I mean, drive over with me to Carn Mornal to-morrow? My friend Trelawny has three fine daughters, and I should like you to make their acquaintance. Tresilian and Trelawny would quarter well on a shield; or would it be impaled? Will you go, Arthur?"
"I regret to say it is impossible, sir."
"When—why?"
"I have been a whole month at the Court, and am now due at a friend's house near—near London."
"London again? The last time you started for London, Trelawny gave me some hints that you never went in that direction so far as the borders of Devonshire. I can't understand your total indifference to the society of ladies, and this resolute celibacy at your time of life. D—n it, sir, it don't look well! and I only hope you hav'n't conceived some unworthy attachment—I mean unworthy the name of Tresilian."
"I have not, sir," replied the other, almost angrily for he still felt the keen legal eye of Basset upon him. "I shall never, I hope, do anything unworthy of the name we bear in common."
"Thank you, Arthur boy. Give me your hand."
"And now, uncle—leaving you and Basset to the Madeira—I'll smoke a cigar in the stable, and look at that horse I mean to take away with me to-morrow."
And anxious to close a conversation, the subject of which pained him deeply, Arthur Tresilian left the stately dining-room, and strolled over the beautiful lawn towards the stable court.
"Can Basset suspect me? Does he know anything? No! no!—he cannot! My poor Diana!" he muttered, "still this humiliating concealment, and no hope save through the death of that poor old man. Accursed be this silly pride of birth!"
* * * * *
"How long papa has been away from us—a whole month!"
"When will papa be home, mamma dear? The cottage seems so dull without him!"
Such were the questions two handsome boys—one was now quite a lad of eighteen—asked of a lady on each side of whom they stood caressingly, while she hastily read a letter which had just come by post.
"In four days, dearest boys, he returns to leave us no more!" she exclaimed, with joy, as she fondly kissed them both, and once more turned to her letter.
"RESTORMEL COURT, Sept. 8.
"MY DARLING DIANA,—My uncle, Sir Launcelot, is gone, poor man! He was found dead abed by his valet this morning. No cause is assigned but old age, yet he was hearty as a brick last night over his Madeira, rallying Basset and me. Well, he has gone, with all his overstrained and old-fashioned ideas of birth, and all that sort of thing. And now for our marriage, dearest—now all justice can be done to you, my much enduring one! I am the sole heir to Restormel, and your Arthur after me. I have written to the curate of H——, Jersey, for the attested copy of our marriage left with him, and expect it by return of post. Kiss our boys for me, and believe me, dearest Diana, your affectionate husband,
"ARTHUR."
Yet she remarked that it was addressed, as usual. "Mrs. Lydiard, Carn Spern Cottage," forgetting that she was unknown by any other name.
"It is well named Carn Spern—the Carn of Thorns—for in some respects, with all our happiness, such has it been to me; but now—now all that is at an end! and blessed be God therefor! Yet it is through death—the death of an old man, however—a very old man! My boys—my innocent boys!—they are so young—they must never know our secret! Yet—how to explain to them the change of name from Lydiard to Tresilian? I must be silent as yet, and consult dear Arthur about this."
And now to go back a little way in the private life of Arthur Tresilian. The favourite nephew and acknowledged heir of his paternal uncle, he had ever been supplied by the latter with a handsome allowance. When travelling or sojourning for a time in Jersey, he had there made the acquaintance of Diana Lydiard, then a girl barely done with her schooling. Her rare beauty fascinated him; but, unfortunately, she was the daughter of one who, at Restormel Court, would have been deemed as a mere tradesman. Arthur knew that he should mortify, offend, and disoblige irrevocably the proud old Sir Launcelot if he made such a mésalliance as to marry Diana Lydiard openly; for he knew that his uncle's immense fortune was entirely at his own disposal, and that he was quite capable of cutting him off with the proverbial "shilling" and leaving the whole to Basset—the careful, plodding, and thrifty Basset.
So they were married; but wherever they went they passed as Mr. and Mrs. Lydiard, the maiden name of Diana. The marriage was duly registered in his name in the book of the little Jersey church, and an attested copy of it was lodged with the incumbent who performed the ceremony.
Arthur Tresilian took his girl-wife to the Continent, as he could then with a safe conscience write home for remittances.
Amid these wanderings two boys were born to them—Arthur and Ralf, whom she so named after her father, and each boy seemed a reproduction of either parent: for the eldest had all the personal attributes of the father—was bluff, bold, and manly; while the latter had all the dark beauty and gentleness of his mother. On the education of these boys Arthur Tresilian spared nothing, and both were already highly accomplished. Everywhere they had the best masters money could procure; but no profession was decided on for Arthur, the eldest, as the false name and the expected wealth raised alike doubts and objections as to what should be done.
Diana Lydiard was the daughter of a tradesman—true; but amid the love she bore her husband, and the luxuries by which his wealth enabled him to surround her, she had ever felt her position to be anomalous, and with it the pride that struggled against shame—a shame that at times became blended with vague fear and sorrow for the future.
And now for the last three years the secret family of Arthur Tresilian had been settled in a little sequestered spot named Carn Spern, near Trevose Head, a rocky cape that juts into the sea westward of Padstow, and some thirty miles or so distant from Restormel Court. There he was known simply as Mr. Lydiard, and by the frequency of his absence was supposed to be a commercial traveller; but as the little family lived quietly, made few acquaintances, and incurred no debts, their lives glided by unnoticed and uncared for by all save the poor, to whom the charity of Mrs. Lydiard was a proverb, and something more solid too.
Through some unseen agency a whisper of an alleged improper connection formed by Arthur did reach the ears of Basset Tresilian, and through him, those of old Sir Launcelot, and in the fury and indignation of the latter, his lofty and aristocratic scorn, he had a foretaste of what awaited him, and the three beings he loved most on earth, if the reality became known.
And now the proud old man was dead, and all necessity for concealment was at an end. Arthur Tresilian succeeded to Restormel Court, with thirty thousand pounds a year; Basset to eight thousand pounds, the baronet's gold repeater, and all the legal works in his library.
"It is well the boys have gone to fish, I have so much to say to you, Diana darling," said Arthur, as he flung his hat away, and clasped his little wife to his breast. "And about the resumption of our name, Diana, they must simply be told that I have succeeded to an estate which requires a change in our designation."
"Excellent, Arthur."
"To-morrow I must start for St. ——."
"For Jersey?"
"Yes, Diana, I am anxious personally to get the attested copy of our marriage certificate by the curate who married us, or a new one from the records. I shall fill up the time of absence by writing my will in your favour and the boys, to make all sure, for one never knows what may happen. When you see me again, Di, both documents shall be snug in this old pocket-book my father gave me."
And laughingly he tapped the heirloom, a handsome scarlet and gilt morocco book, on the boards of which were the Tresilian arms, surmounted by a griffin, stamped in gold.
"A strange little episode, almost a romantic one, has occurred during your absence, dear," said Mrs. Tresilian, for so we must now call her; "Arthur has quite fallen in love with a young lady, whom he has met riding her pony among the green lanes near Padstow."
"Arthur—that mere boy. It won't last long, Di."
"I hope not, and so will you, perhaps, when I tell who she is, and the risk we have run: Mona Tresilian!"
"What, my brother Basset's daughter?"
"Yes, Arthur."
"But the girl has gone to London with him, and that will end the affair. And now to-morrow, darling, I must leave you by the train for Falmouth, whence I shall take the steamer to Jersey. When I return the carriage shall be sent on here for you and our two dear little fellows, as I wish you to enter Restormel Court in the state that befits you, though my uncle's hatchment still hangs above its porte cochère."
Next day she was alone once more, and he had sailed hopefully on his errand.
The hour she had pined for during eighteen years—never so much as after the birth of her boy Arthur—when she should sink the dubious name of Lydiard and be acknowledged as the wife of Arthur Tresilian, had come at last, and a thrill of the purest joy filled her heart. In her anxiety for her children's future she felt small sorrow for the death of the octogenarian. How should she feel more?
His absurd pride had kept her under a species of cloud for eighteen years, as a person unknown to the world, and as one even now to be recognised with wonder—yea, perchance with doubt.
The period of her life so longed for, not for its wealth, but when she and her children should take their place in the world as Tresilians, had come at last. There are times when an hour seems long. Oh, then, how long must days, and weeks, and months, appear, when they roll into years? All time passes inexorably, however. While she sat reflecting thus her eldest son was engaged elsewhere, but not, as she thought, with his fishing-rod.
"And you are going to London with your papa?" said he to a fair-haired and blue-eyed girl, who was clad in deep mourning, and who had pulled up her pony in one of the grassy and shady lanes near the unsavoury old fishing town of Padstow.
"Yes, and we leave by the train to-night."
"And I shall see you——"
"Perhaps never again, Arthur," replied the girl, with her face full of smiles and tears, for she was less affected than her lover. "I shall never forget you, Mr. Lydiard, or all the pleasant walks and meetings we have had, by these green lanes, by the Bray-hill above the sea, and ever so many places more."
"And you call me Mr. Lydiard? Oh, Mona, can you leave me so coldly?" he asked, sadly; "may I not write to you in London?"
"Ah, good heavens, no!" she exclaimed, with all a school-girl's terror. "What would mamma say? And then there is papa!"
It was delightful to have a lover; but not delightful that the fact should come to the ears of such a papa as Mr. Basset Tresilian.
"Then I have no hope?"
"Yes, you have," said she, playfully tickling his face with her riding switch.
"Oh, name it, Mona!"
"I have an uncle named Tresilian down here in this country."
"He who succeeded to Restormel Court, or some such place?"
"Exactly, Arthur—the same."
"Well?" asked Arthur, little thinking that she referred to his own and well-loved father.
"Papa thinks we shall spend our Christmas holidays with him.—he is so jolly!—and, somehow, it will go hard with me if I don't get an invitation for Mr. Arthur Lydiard."
An expression of thanks and quietude spread over the young man's face, mingled with great sadness, for she added,—
"I must go now—must leave you, Arthur."
"Oh, Mona! Mona! it seems so hard to lose you now!"
"My darling Arthur!" exclaimed the girl, giving way to a shower of tears, as his arms encircled her slender waist, and she permitted her soft, bright face to fall upon his shoulder. But at that moment they were rudely interrupted.
Arthur felt himself seized by the arm and thrust violently aside by a grave and stern-looking man about forty years of age. This person was in mourning, and instinct told the lover that he must be Mona's father. He seized her pony by the bridle, and—after darting a furious glance at Arthur, a glance not unmingled with surprise, as he saw in his face a likeness to some one, he knew not whom—led the young lady away through a wicket in a thick beech-hedge and shut it. Ere he did so, however, he turned and said to Arthur,—
"Whoever you are, young fellow, let such tomfoolery cease. This young lady leaves to-night for London. Attempt to write to, or follow her, at your peril; and I may add that we shall dispense with the pleasure of your distinguished society at Restormel Court in the Christmas week."
Arthur's spirit was proud and fiery. He made a spring towards the little gate, but checked himself; he felt that he dared not confront, in wrath, the father of the girl he loved, and so he turned sadly and hopelessly away, like a good, simple-hearted lad as he was, to tell his mother all about it, for he concealed nothing from her; but, somewhat to his surprise and chagrin, instead of sympathising with his disappointment, or betraying indignation at the "flinty-hearted father," she laughed merrily, smiled, and kissed him, thrusting at the same time into her bosom a letter she had just received from her husband.
"But I shall never see her more, mamma," urged Arthur, piteously.
"You shall, Arthur—you shall! be assured of that. Did your own mamma ever deceive you?"
"No, no, never!" replied Arthur, hopefully.
"And she is to be at Restormel—is that the name of the place?"
"Yes, mamma; Restormel Court—a grand place, they say."
"At Christmas? Well, Arthur, and you shall be there too, or your mamma is no true prophetess."
Diana's husband had reached Jersey in safety, and gone to the little secluded church of St. ——, where they had offered their mutual vows to heaven on that eventful morning, so well remembered still, when their only witnesses were the parish clerk and sexton.
"The poor old curate"—so ran his letter—"you remember his thin, spare figure, with a long black, rusty coat, diagonal shovel hat, gaiters, and white choker—has gone to his last home under the old yew-tree that for centuries has guarded the burial-ground. By a destructive fire in the vestry the whole of the marriage registers, and some of the baptismal ditto, have perished before the copies thereof were transmitted to headquarters—wherever that may be; but I have, most fortunately, oh, my Diana! by the special providence of heaven, secured the attested copy of our marriage lines, which the old curate made at my request from the now defunct register. It was found among his papers by his successor, and is now in my possession—in the old scarlet pocket-book, together with my will, which I have carefully drawn up in favour of you and our boys, and signed before witnesses. I mean to spend two days here with an old friend, and shall return by the steamer Queen Guinevère, which leaves Jersey for Falmouth on Friday, and which, by-the-bye, has on board a large sum in specie coming from France to England."
"Friday? On Saturday I shall see him!" thought the wife in her heart, with a sigh of relief, and a prayer of thanks to heaven. "The register of their marriage had perished! What if the attested copy had been lost? Oh, what then would have been the fate, the future, of their idolized sons—her tall and handsome Arthur, her merry little dark-eyed Ralf?"
Thursday passed; Friday, too; then came Saturday, but no Arthur Tresilian, or Lydiard, as she had to call him still at Carn Spern. There came tidings, however, that the Queen Guinevère had left Jersey duly, but had never reached Falmouth. Great was the anxiety, grief, and terror of the little family at Carn Spern; for there had been a severe storm in the Channel, and many ships had been driven ashore about the Lizard and Land's End; but none of these were steamers, and a whisper began to spread abroad that the Queen Guinevère must have foundered and gone down at sea, or some trace of her would have been found upon the coast. But all doubts were speedily resolved, when, on the third day after she was due at Falmouth, Derrick Polkinghorne, coxswain of the Padstow life-boat, discovered her shattered hull sunk and wedged in a chasm of the rocks near the lighthouse on Trevose Head. How she had come to be stranded there on the other side of Cornwall was a mystery to all, unless she had been blown by the late tempest completely round the Land's End, and been forced to run for shelter by St. Ives and Ligger Bay. Much wreckage and many bodies were cast on the beach; but, though none of them proved to be that of Arthur Tresilian—or Mr. Lydiard, as he was called—no doubt remained in the anguished mind of Diana that he had perished, and she at once wrote to his brother Basset, announcing the event, her existence, and the legal claims of herself and her children.
All this complication proved very startling to Basset. He knew nothing of his brother's Jersey journey, though he always suspected his secret ties; but, ignoring the latter, he at once put his household in super-mourning, and took possession of Restormel Court as his own, leaving, however, no means untried to prove the death by drowning of Arthur Tresilian, though the name of Lydiard was borne on the list of passengers.
The following day saw Diana and her sons, attired in deepest mourning, at the Court, requesting an audience with Mr. Basset Tresilian—her close cap and concealed hair, her long crape weepers, and face deadly with pallor, announcing her recent widowhood, which Basset viewed with a sneer, as with a haggard eye she looked at the stiff ancestral portraits, the cedar carvings of the stately library, the blazing fire, the gleaming tiles, and picturesque furniture of white and gold and crimson velvet.
She announced with quiet dignity, yet not without doubt and much perturbation, that she came as the widow of the late Mr. Tresilian, to claim her place, and the places of his children, at Restormel Court. He replied, calmly—
"You have proofs, I presume, of all this, Mrs.—Mrs. Lydiard?"
"Mrs. Tresilian, sir!" said she, while her Arthur, in silence and bewilderment, recognised an uncle in the father of his Mona.
Alas! Diana had neither the certificate nor the will; both had gone down into the deep, with her hapless husband. She had, however, the letter referring to those documents: but Basset, after a furtive glance at the fire, tossed it hack to her contemptuously, saying—
"I have heard of you before, madam—years ago, too. My brother is drowned, and you are now poor. I dislike death and poverty, and all that sort of thing; but I'll do what I can in the way of Christian charity, and have your hulking boys bound to trades. But you must leave this place at once; the ladies of my family must not come in contact with—such as you."
She rose, and left the stately house mechanically, with one hand on Arthur's arm and the other on the neck of Ralf; and she looked at them in agony—the latter her little pet, the other the stately king of the playing fields, and captain of the school eleven, to be tradesmen!
Deep in the hearts of both boys sank their mother's grief; but deepest in the heart of Arthur, who felt himself called upon to do something—he knew not what.
He spent hours and days upon the solitary rock above where the wreck lay, looking at the spot with haggard eyes. Oh, if that shattered hull had a voice—had the dead that came ashore the power of utterance, the secret of his father's fate might be revealed; but three months had passed, and who could doubt it now? One morning early, as he came to the accustomed spot, under the grim shadow of Trevose Head, he found the puffins scared away, and the solitude invaded by others—one of whom he knew well, Derrick Polkinghorne, a bold and hardy native of the Scilly Isles, where people spend so much of their time on the boisterous ocean that for one who dies abed nine are drowned; and, by order of Lloyd's agent, he was preparing a diving bell to examine the wreck, as much specie was known to be on board of her.
"Mornin', Muster Lydiard," said he, for he and Arthur had frequently boated together; "that's a smart yacht outside the Lines. Sir Launcelot Tresilian's she was—Master Basset's now."
"What is her name?"
"The Bashful Maid."
"She sails like a duck!"
"She does. Ah, there's ne'er a craft out o' Cowes like that 'ere Bashful Maid!—'specially when she's got a dandy rigged astarn; then she hugs the wind beautiful! Just goin' down to 'ave a squint at this here wreck."
"Take me with you, Derrick; for heaven's sake do!" implored the lad.
"What on earth do you want down there?"
"Only a scrap of paper, perhaps, Derrick."
"Then you ain't like to find it, you ain't."
"I should like to see the deck my father stood on last."
"I understand that, I does. Come, then. I wonders as he went to sea in that craft, for last time she left Falmouth the rats rushed out of her in thousands; and they never does that for nothin'. But as for finding paper here, you'll be like them as mistook the mild reflex of the lunar horb for a remarkably fine Stilton. But here we goes; and now take care on yourself."
With a thrill of awe and horror, oddly not unmingled with delight and a sense of novelty, Arthur took his place beside Derrick on the seat that was placed across the bell, which at once began to descend. Light was admitted by convex lenses, through which were seen the long trailing weeds, the creeping things of ocean, and now and then the sea-green faces of the blackening dead!
They passed downward into the water, which surged against the sides of the bell, and rippled over the lenses till they were close to the bulged wreck. Her starboard bow was completely smashed upon the rocks; the cargo had been washed out, and was still oozing forth by degrees. Already barnacles and weeds were growing on it, and dreary, dreary and desolate looked that shattered hull at the bottom of the sea; and Arthur surveyed it with tears of the keenest grief.
"Suppose a shark stuck its nose into the bell?" said Polkinghorne.
"I don't care if one did," said Arthur.
"A dead body? and, by Jove, here's one coming in grim earnest. On his face, it's a man. Women allus floats on their backs; how's that, Muster Lydiard?"
"My name is——" but he checked himself, for now a corpse, which Derrick had roused with his pole, came slowly athwart the stage at the bottom of the bell, and remained there.
Suddenly a cry escaped Arthur! The grey great coat upon it, all sodden and studded with weeds and limpets, he recognised as one usually worn by his lost father, and, longing to know more, he implored Derrick to examine it; for himself, he dared not move, or breathe, or think! Oh, could it be, that those poor remains, half devoured by fish, and floating face downward in the sea, were all that remained of his handsome and beloved father?
"Hold on, lad, shut your eyes; and I'll soon see," cried the resolute diver, as he lowered himself to the loathsome task of examining the remains.
Arthur dared not look; but ere long a cold metal watch was placed in his hand.
"It is not papa's," said he, with a sigh of relief, that ended in a cry of horror, for as those in charge of the bell began to raise it, the water surged within it and dashed about the corpse, which came against him again and again, till Derrick, who was investigating its pockets, thrust it with his pole out of the bell, which in another minute was suspended over the sunny surface of the sea.
"See, Muster Lydiard, I've found a pocket-book into that ere poor fellow's overcoat," said Derrick.
"It is my papa's!" shrieked the lad; "his old scarlet book, with his arms and crest upon it."
And in that book, safe and dry, were the lost will and certificate of marriage.
"But, oh," moaned the lad, when he had told his mother this startling occurrence, as he sank half sick upon her breast, "if that was poor papa I saw, he came from his grave in the sea, mamma, with those papers for you!"
But the body was soon known to be that of a channel pilot.
Ere the end of that week Basset Tresilian had to change his tone, and Diana and her sons took legal steps to make her the mistress and them the masters of Restormel Court. So autumn drew towards winter; but ere the sad widow quitted Carn Spern, one night a carriage drew up, a man alighted, full of bustle and excitement; a well-known voice was heard, and Arthur Tresilian, the elder, was clasped in the arms of his half-fainting wife.
Washed overboard from the steamer, he had been picked up by a vessel bound for Cuba; his coat had been donned by the pilot, so there was an end of all the sorrow and mystery.