But what had it all been about? “Ah! haven’t you heard?” And then the mysterious nods and winks would increase tenfold, and the whispered communication would be received in various ways according to the temperament or capacity for humbug of the hearer—but always with a thirst for more particulars. For instance, why should Mr Dorrien have interested himself on behalf of that precious rascal, Gipsy Steve? Must it not have been on Lizzie’s account, and, of course, all young men were desperately wicked, and anyone with half an eye could see through that brick wall; and so the matter had come to the General’s ears. But this story was very soon improved upon, and presently it was that Gipsy Steve had sworn to shoot the young Squire unless he did justice to Lizzie—and it was while Roland was making this announcement to his father, that the latter had hurled an inkstand at his head, and now he had made himself scarce, fearing the ex-poacher’s vengeance. Others again scouted this version. Roland Dorrien was not the man to be afraid of anyone—rightly or wrongly—not he. Besides, Lizzie had no more to do with the concern than they, the speakers, had. It was Olive Ingelow who was the real apple of discord. Couldn’t anyone see that the two were never apart, that the young Squire spent most of his evenings at the Rectory, and how he and the young lady wandered about the lanes together, or sat on the beach all day long!—and now, it turned out that they had been privately married, and that the General had sworn he would never recognise it or set eyes on his son again.
This rumour, once let loose, ranged at will, and these and a dozen other stories, each more preposterous than its predecessor, were circulated throughout Wandsborough, and all the region round about, and gained more or less of ready credence. Among those by whom they were accepted, opinions were divided anent the respective conduct of the General and his son in connection with the affair. Some held that the former was a domestic tyrant of the very worst order, and that the latter had, at last, justifiably rebelled—others again extolled the General as a model parent and a high-principled Christian man, while poor Roland, it was declared, had always been a depraved reprobate and an irreclaimable scamp; in short—and whatever had happened now, he had been rightly served. Then there were not wanting a few who held that between the two it was six of one and half a dozen of the other—that the Dorriens were at best an ill-conditioned, quarrelsome lot, and the less one had to do with them the better.
At Ardleigh Court the tidings of the Dorrien quarrel were received with surprise and dismay. The Colonel warmly espoused the cause of the absent, wherein his wife differed with him wholly. Young men were so intolerably self-opinionated now-a-days, she declared, that no doubt General Dorrien had not been unjustified in what he did. However, having so far vindicated her principles of contradictiousness, she was fain to admit that Roland seemed far more sensible than most young men of his age, and she liked what she had seen of him. Whatever Clara may have thought, she said very little, though on one or two occasions she had stood up—rather warmly for her—for the exile; and Maud, albeit she had wrangled a good deal with him during his stay there, was really sorry for him, though being of a romantic turn she was inclined to feel very angry with him on her sister’s account, her lively imagination having long since settled all that.
“A pack of infernal lies?” cried the Colonel with heat, referring to some of the reports which had come to his ears concerning the absent. “Pooh! I don’t believe a word of them. Dorrien’s a quick-tempered fellow—always was, by Jove! and Roland’s a chip of the old block. I suppose they lost their tempers with each other, and came to high words. As for all that slander, and bringing girls’ names into the concern, why, it’s scandalous.”
“Well, where there’s smoke there must be some fire,” suggested his wife, with characteristic originality.
“Fire be damned, ahem! I beg your pardon,” exploded the good-hearted Colonel. “And I tell you what it is. That libellous old Jezebel—what’s her name?—Frewen, for instance, will find herself in Court if she doesn’t look out. Libel’s a criminal offence, and if she comes before us, I’ll commit her for trial—I will, by Jove, as sure as I’m Chairman of Petty Sessions!”
“I think you’re rather hard on her,” objected Mrs Neville, true to her colours. “She didn’t originate these stories, remember.”
“It’s my belief she did!” retorted the Colonel. “She hates the Ingelows, and would move heaven and earth to injure them—spiteful, canting old harridan. I think Ingelow mistaken, and his vestments and candles and popish fal-lal great bosh—but hang it! he’s a thoroughly good fellow in private life, and I’m not going to stand by and see him worried and his girls’ characters taken away by that slanderous old Gamp, who probably began life in a chandler’s shop—and I’ll let him know that I’m not. I’ll call on him this very afternoon, by George, I will?”
At Cranston, as may be supposed, cheerful times did not prevail. Always gloomy and constrained, the gloom and constraint deepened tenfold in the days following upon the rupture. The General’s ill-humour was now chronic, and when he did speak it was usually to make some incisive remark calculated to render everyone thoroughly ill at ease. Mrs Dorrien was freezingly acid, and the household saw no one and went nowhere, and, needless to say, all reference to the erring one was strictly taboo. Hubert heartily wished the Vacation would be quick and come to an end, and being considerably bored, and proportionately irritable, his sister had to bear the brunt of his—among other—ill-tempers. As for poor Nellie, she felt the separation terribly. She had little thought that morning that she had seen the last of Roland, without even saying goodbye, too. And now she was forbidden even to write to him. Life was very hard—would better times ever come?