CHAP. XIII.
What man was he talked with you?
Much Ado about Nothing.
It was not till the crisis of danger was already past that the illness of Katharine became known at Bolton Grange, or at Old Beech.
Jane Lambert was no sooner apprised of it than she hastened to her friend, and insisted, with all the devotion and tenderness of a sister, on being permitted to divide with Mistress Alice the duties of her present charge.
Katharine loved Jane, and was comforted to have her seated near her, and was soothed by her affection: it was evident, however, to the latter, that something weighed heavily upon the spirits of her friend, and that the feelings of hope and the clear promise of recovery, did not impart to her all the gratitude and cheerfulness which might be naturally expected in the pleasant dawn of convalescence.
She had not been many days at Milverton when an incident occurred which discovered the cause of her anxiety.
As Jane was looking from the window in the afternoon, and remarking to Katharine on the beautiful effect of the low autumn lights, she observed the figure of a man with folded arms leaning near a tree in the beechery, and she playfully exclaimed, “That must certainly be the musical ghost, which played so sweetly, and brought us all such bad luck, and frightened every body in Milverton House but your dear self, and the grave Master Cuthbert:—how I should like to have the treacherous creature caught.”
“Dear lady,” said Katharine’s maid, “how can you talk so boldly?—why nobody can catch a spirit. It is only air.”
“I have a notion, good lass,” replied Jane, “that it is very proper flesh and blood, and if I were a man, and not a maid, would try my speed with it, and bring it to parley. I should like to hear the voice of it, or see its face, and tell it of all the mischief it has done.”
“Well-a-day! what a heart you have, lady! There is not one in the kitchen but stout Richard would venture that; and though he could not find any thing the other day when he followed it, he’s obstinate as a mule, and says it’s no ghost, but a young gallant that’s under hiding at my mother’s, in Warwick Liberties; but there is nobody thinks with him at Milverton.”
“Well, then, I am of Richard’s way of thinking, in part:—it is a tall man; but whether young, and whether under hiding, I know not.”
“Why, there is a gentleman under hiding at my mother’s, sure enough, and one that knows my lady, as she says, and was quite glad when he heard that she first began to mend.”
“Ruth,” said Katharine, raising her head from the pillow, “if you will go and make me some fresh barley water, I think I shall like it better than this fever drink.” The wish was no sooner expressed than her maid vanished to do her bidding, and Katharine and her friend Jane were left by themselves.
“Jane,” said the invalid, “come and sit by me: I have something to tell you, and I have to ask of you a very strange favour. I desired to relieve my heart of its burden, but have hitherto delayed it. You know, Jane, that I love you, and that I have confidence in your attachment to me; but if it were not for my present helplessness, which compels me to engage your service as a true friend, whose good sense and firm principles I can safely trust, the subject which I am about to speak of would never have passed my lips even to you. The gentleman of whom they speak is my cousin Francis. He it was who so perplexed and alarmed the family with his mysterious music, and who still, I fear, haunts the same spot in silence and anxiety.”
“Your cousin Francis!—why, dear Kate, I thought he was in America!”
“And I myself thought so until the night when he made his return known to me in tones which I could not mistake, and the meaning of which I but too well understood.”
“I have been long aware, Katharine, that he loved you.”
“You have, I believe, already discerned it. Alas! it is true—fatally for his own happiness and for mine;—but, Jane, have you courage for the task which I would impose upon you?”
“Yes, Kate: you can ask me nothing too hard for me, if I can only feel that I do what may comfort you.”
“Well, Jane, you must contrive to see my cousin Francis; to deliver to him a note from me with your own hands, and to urge his immediate departure from this neighbourhood. Now, love, bring me those small tablets and paper, and support me while I write the few words which I would say.”
It was a sight for pity to see that noble damsel, her back propped by pillows, and the arm of her young friend tenderly supporting her, trace in silence and with a nervous hand the few lines which were to banish from the neighbourhood of Milverton her worthy and devoted lover.
The task was soon done; and with the care as of a mother Jane Lambert again arranged the pillows for the aching head of Katharine; and the pale sufferer sunk back exhausted into the recumbent posture, and heaved a sigh so sad, that the eyes of Jane filled with thick tears. She averted her head to wipe them away, that they might not distress her friend, and putting the unsealed billet in her bosom, left the chamber with a thoughtful step, to do her very delicate and difficult office. She went to her own room, and taking a dark mantle with a hood, such as was the common church-going and street costume of women of the respectable middle classes of that period, she threw it across her arm, and walked through the Lime Walk, and by the fish ponds, to a small gate at the farther end of the grounds, by which she could gain a footpath that led across the fields to Warwick. She had no sooner passed the gate than she put on her cloak, and passing the hood over her head, that she might muffle and conceal her features, if she met any one, she proceeded towards the city. It was about four o’clock in the afternoon, and the sky was lowering and cloudy. She was anxious about her strange mission, and settling in her mind what she should do when she reached the hostelry, whither she was now bending her steps, and how she should contrive the interview with Francis, when the sound of steps very closely following suddenly startled her: the very object of her search had overtaken her, and was already at her side. At first, however, she was not aware of this, although the circumstance of this passenger being muffled, as closely as herself, awakened her suspicions of the truth, and forbade the alarm she would otherwise have felt at finding herself in a very lonely part of the pathway in such company. He did not stop when he overtook her, but went a few steps onward, as if to re-assure her before he ventured to speak. He crossed a stile and walked some paces without turning his head, till she had also crossed it; when loitering a little, till she was close to him, he stepped aside from the path, and gently put a question that very directly introduced them to each other, and gave Jane the ready opportunity of delivering her note, and fulfilling the further wishes of her dear Katharine.
“You are from Milverton House, as I think, damsel?”
“Even so, master,” replied Jane.
“Is the noble young mistress better to-day?”
“I thank God she is; but it will be long ere she be quite well again.”
“She is out of all pain, I hope?”
“Yes, she hath no bodily pain, save that which arises from weakness; and for such pain of mind as disquiets her it may be, in great part, removed by yourself, Master Francis.”
Thus saying, she threw back her hood, and Francis, who had before discovered his own features, recognised those of Jane Lambert. “I bear you a note from your cousin Katharine,” she added, as he started at her utterance of his name. She drew it forth from her bosom, and placed it in his hand. He turned from her that he might read it without observation; but Jane could see by his action that he kissed it, and pressed it to his heart. With a glance it was perused, and then again and again; and with a bent head and staggering step he moved a few paces from Jane, and spoke in tones of anguish to himself words which she could not distinguish. At last, collecting himself, he returned towards the fair messenger of his Katharine, with a manly composure, and said, “Tell my beloved cousin that I will obey; that her wish is as a law to me: how could she dream that I would suffer the words of any one to outweigh her own?—but, she tells me that you are her devoted and faithful friend, and that to you I may safely intrust the object of my return, and the news of my father. There is, indeed, one subject on which she forbids me to speak even to herself; therefore my answer may be brief enough. My father is well:—all her kinsfolk in the Plantations are well, and free, and happy. For the object of my sudden return—it is the love of my country—a love that will not accept a divided heart; and yet the other love that lay enshrined beside it, was pure, was noble, was worthy such alliance, has filled my thoughts by day, has blessed the visions of my lonely nights. Tell Katharine she hath used me hardly—no, no, do not tell her that—not hardly—say that she bids me do something I cannot do—I am not of her order—forget her I never can—she is with me wherever I go—in all things that I do I think of her—and still must, if I would have fair and noble thoughts to bear me company.”
“Such things, Master Francis, I may not carry to her ear. There is about her a reserve so maidenly and grave, she would chide her own messenger for proving so unfaithful;—but I may tell her that your father is well; that loyalty hath brought you home; and that you will quit these parts instantly—for that it is, methinks, she most earnestly requests of you.”
“Even so: on that she is most urgent—cruel Katharine.”
“Say, rather, wise, dutiful, loyal Katharine.”
“Loyal, loyal!—that is a word of many imports. I, too, am loyal, and will learn to love the word:—mind you tell her that I am loyal.”
“Can I truly tell her so?”
“Yes, truly:—but enough of this, fair girl,—go back to her who sent thee—wait, you are her friend—you nurse her—come, let me look into thine eyes—give me thy hand—on my knees I kiss it—her cheek is pale—I know it is—it must be—go touch it with thy hand, and offer there the chaste cold homage of my sorrow. You see that I am sad, lady—go—bless you—you are weeping:—how is this, girl?—be not so childish—a friend of Katharine’s should not be weak—I, you see, am calm and strong—my hand does not tremble—and these eyes are dry—methinks my heart is frozen—tell her so.”
Jane Lambert stood fixed as a statue while he thus spoke; and as she watched him walking fast away, she felt, for the first time in her life, what it must be to have a lover, and to be the supreme object of such a man’s affection. Her cheek was stained with tears—her face flushed with agitation—her whole air disordered and absent. She followed with her eyes the tall figure of Francis, till a turn in the pathway hid him from her view, and then walked slowly back to Milverton.
In the very first field she met George Juxon, and it was evident to her, from his manner, as he stopped and spoke to her, that he must have witnessed, at least, the close of her interview with Francis. There was a surprise in his look, and something of embarrassment, as he shook her by the hand, and asked if she was well; but he did not seem to expect any particular reply, nor indeed did he offer to return with her to the house, though she was but too conscious that her faintness and discomposure might have naturally invited such an attention. Observing, coldly, that he had some business at a builder’s yard in Warwick, but that he should return to sup and sleep at Milverton, he leisurely pursued his path to the city.
Jane’s heart gave way to the multitude of troublous and perplexing thoughts which now beset her; and leaning near a friendly tree, she found a momentary relief in a passionate flood of warm tears.
Her trial was strange. The feelings which had been excited were altogether new to her; and the effect of the interview with Katharine’s devoted cousin, combined with the cross and perplexing incident of her meeting with Juxon so immediately after, as to make it certain that he had seen her part from Francis Heywood, had very naturally overcome the ordinary courage and the cheerful composure of her character.
She had witnessed, in the agitated Francis, the emotions of love. The sentiment, which thus shook him, she had never yet inspired—she had never felt for any one. Such love had been to her the poet’s fable; but it would never again be so deemed of by her;—and something that made her heart throb and ache within her told truly the want of that heart, and unsealed a fountain of affection ready to overflow upon any being in whom she might be fortunate enough to find the noble qualities of a manly heart, and the gentle ways and genuine fervours of an ardent lover.
It was a cruel thought that she must now be subject to suspicions, if not of lightness, yet of a secret attachment and stolen interviews with the object of it. Nor was the oppression of this thought at all weakened by the reflection that George Juxon, the very man whose good opinion she most valued, had seen her in a situation, and under circumstances, which he could not by any possibility interpret truly, and which her duty to Katharine forbade her to explain, however deeply her own character or happiness might suffer. In one short hour she had gathered an experience that filled her with wonder, and had incurred a suspicion that subjected her to censure and threatened her with misery. The consciousness of innocence could not restore to her the respect of Juxon, nor exempt her from the severe penalties with which the levity and imprudence of the thoughtless of her own sex are ever silently visited by the other, when some painful discovery of a woman’s guile chills and revolts them.
However in her case, the judgment of Juxon had not been harsh; but, of course, when he saw a man upon his knees before her—when he considered the loneliness of their place of interview—the cloaks evidently worn for disguise—and the agitated and discomposed appearance of Jane Lambert—he, at once, decided that she was betrothed to a lover, whom for fear or for shame she dared not openly avow.
He had truly liked Jane, for her spirit, her sense, and, above all, for her devotion to Katharine Heywood; and his liking might soon have grown to a manly love,—but the flow of his admiration was now suddenly checked and frozen, and he whistled “Woman’s a Riddle” all the way to Warwick and back again.