She choked down a sob, passed the drum to me, and put the drumsticks into my hands. And so by signs rather than by words, she began to teach me; scarcely letting me tap the vellum, but instructing me rather how to hold the sticks and move my wrists. So quiet were we that the old man by and by dropped asleep: and then, as she taught, her tears flowed.
This was the first of many lessons; for I spent a full fortnight at Minden Cottage, free of its ample walled garden, but never showing my face in the high road or at the windows looking upon it. I learned from Isabel that Whitmore had not been found, and that Archibald and his regiment had sailed for Lisbon. Sometimes Miss Belcher or Mr. Rogers paid us a visit, and once the two together: and always they held long talks with the Major in his summer-house. But they never invited me to be present at these interviews.
So the days slipped away and I almost forgot my fears, nor speculated how or when the end would come. My elders were planning this for me, and meanwhile life, if a trifle dull, was pleasant enough. What vexed me was the old man's obdurate politeness towards Isabel, and her evident distress. It angered me the more that, when she was not by he gave never a sign that he brooded on what had befallen, but went on placidly polishing his petty and (to me) quite uninteresting verses.
But there came an evening when we finished the Fourth Georgic together.
"Of tillage, timber, herds, and hives, thus far
My trivial lay—while Caesar thunders war
To deep Euphrates, conquers, pacifies,
Twice wins the world and now attempts the skies.
Pardon thy Virgil that Parthenope
Sufficed a poor tame scholar, who on thee
Whilom his boyish pastoral pipe essayed,
—Thee, Tityrus, beneath the beechen shade."
"Of tillage, timber, herds, and hives, thus far
My trivial lay—while Caesar thunders war
To deep Euphrates, conquers, pacifies,
Twice wins the world and now attempts the skies.
Pardon thy Virgil that Parthenope
Sufficed a poor tame scholar, who on thee
Whilom his boyish pastoral pipe essayed,
—Thee, Tityrus, beneath the beechen shade."
He closed the book.
"Lord Wellington is not a Caesar," he said and paused, musing: then, in a low voice, "Parthenope—Parthenope—and to-morrow 'Arms and the man.' Boy," said he sharply, "we do not translate the Aeneid."
"No, sir?"
"Mr. Rogers calls for you to-night. A draft of the 52nd Regiment sails from Plymouth to-morrow. You will find, when you join it in Spain, that—that my son-in-law"—he hesitated and spoke the word with a certain prim deliberateness—"has been gazetted to an ensigncy in that gallant regiment. I may tell you that he owes this to no intervention of mine, but solely to the generosity of Miss Belcher. Before departing—I will do him so much justice—he spoke to me very frankly of his past, and for my daughter's sake and his father's I trust that, as under Providence you were an instrument in averting its consequences, so you may sound him yet to some action which, whether he lives or falls, may redeem it. Mr. Rogers will sup with us to-night. If I mistake not, I hear his wheels on the road." He drew himself up to his full height and bowed. "You have done a service, boy, to the honour of two families. I thank you for it, and shall not omit to remember you daily when I thank God. Shall we go in?"