Ladies of mature charms are less easily taken aback by such advances than their inexperienced juniors. The position, even if new in practice, is by no means so in theory, and having often anticipated the attack, they are the more prepared to receive it when it arrives. Ere our lovers reached No. 9 he had called her by her Christian name, and “Rachel” had promised to think of it. As she closed the “area-gate” Gingham had given her heart away to a scamp. True, she was oldish, uglyish, wore brown thread gloves, and had a yellow skin; yet for all this she had a woman’s heart, and, like a very woman, gave it away to Tom Blacke without a return.
In good time General Bounce arrived, and took the command from Frank Hardingstone, with many gracious acknowledgments of his kindness. The General was a man of far too great importance to be introduced at the conclusion of a chapter. It is sufficient to say, that with military promptitude and decision (which generally means a disagreeable and abrupt method of doing a simple thing) he set the household in order, arranged the sad ceremony, over which he presided with proper gravity, packed Cousin Charlie off to his private tutor’s, paid the servants their wages, and settled the departure of himself and niece for his own residence.
Do we think ourselves of account in this our world?—do we think we shall be so missed and so regretted? Drop a stone into a pool, there is a momentary splash, a bubble on the surface, and circle after circle spreads, and widens and weakens, till all is still and smooth as though the water had never been disturbed; so it is with death. There is a funeral and crape and weeping, and “callings to inquire,” then the intelligence gets abroad amongst mere acquaintances and utter strangers, a line in the Times proclaims our decease to the world. Ere it has reached the colonies we are well-nigh forgotten at home.
Mrs. Kettering was at rest in her grave; the General was full of his arrangements and his responsibilities; Charlie was back amongst his mathematics and his cricket and his Greek and Latin; the servants were looking out for fresh places; and the life that had disappeared from the surface was forgotten by all. By all save one; for still Blanche was gazing on the waters and mourning for her mother.
[CHAPTER V]
UNCLE BALDWIN
NEWTON-HOLLOWS AND ITS GROUNDS—BACHELORS’ BILLETS—THE HEIRESS AND HER COMPANION—GENERAL BOUNCE—A GENTLEMAN FARMER—THE LADIES’ CLUB—A WOMAN’S IDEAL
In an unpretending corner of the “Guyville Guide and Midland Counties’ Directory” a few lines are devoted to inform the tourist that “Newton-Hollows, post-town Guyville, in the Hundred of Cow-capers, is the seat of Major-General Bounce, etc., etc., etc. The lover of the picturesque obtains, from the neighbourhood of this mansion, a magnificent view, comprising no less than seventeen churches, a vast expanse of wood and meadow-land, the distant spires of Bubbleton, and the imposing outline of the famous Castle Guy.” Doubtless all these beauties might have been conspicuous had the adventurous tourist chosen to climb one of the lofty elms with which the house was surrounded; but from the altitude of his own stature he was obliged to content himself with a far less extensive landscape, seeing that the country was closely wooded, and as flat as his hand. But Newton-Hollows was one of those sweet little places, self-contained and compact, that require no distant views, no shaggy scenery, no “rough heath and rugged wood,” to enhance their charm. Magnificent old timber, “the oak and the ash, and the bonny ivy tree,” to say nothing of elms and chestnuts, dotted the meadows and pastures in which the mansion was snugly ensconced. People driving up, or rather along, the level approach, were at a loss to make out where the farms ended and the park began. Well-kept lawns, that looked as if they were fresh mown every morning, swept up to the drawing-room windows, opening to the ground; not a leaf was strewn on sward or gravel; not a weed, nor even a daisy, permitted to show its modest head above the surface; and as for a rake, roller, or a gardener’s hat being left in a place where such instruments have no business, why, the General would have made the unfortunate delinquent eat it—rake, roller, or “wide-a-awake”—and discharged him besides on the spot. No wonder the flower-garden adjoining the conservatory, which again opened into the drawing-room, looked so trim and well-kept: “Master’s” hobby was a garden, and, though utterly ignorant of the names, natures, and treatment of plants, he liked to see every variety in his possession, and spared no expense on their cultivation; and so a head gardener and five subalterns carried off all the prizes at the Bubbleton and Guyville horticulturals; and the General complained that he could never get a nosegay for his table, nor a bit of fruit for his dessert fit to eat. Yet were there worse “billets” in this working world than Newton-Hollows. The Bubbleton “swells” and county dignitaries found it often “suit their hunting arrangements” to go, over-night, and dine with “old Bounce.” He would always “put up a hack for you,” than which no effort of hospitality makes a man more deservedly popular in a hunting country; and his dinners, his Indian dishes, his hot pickles, his dry champagne, his wonderful claret (“not a headache in a hogshead, sir,” the General would say, with a frown of defiance), were all in keeping with the snug, comfortable appearance of his dwelling, and the luxurious style which men who have served long in the army, and often been obliged to “rough it,” know so well how to enjoy. Then there was no pretension about the thing whatever. The house, though it ranged over a considerable extent of ground, particularly towards the offices, was only two storeys high—“a mere cottage,” its owner called it; but a cottage in which the apartments were all roomy and well-proportioned, in which enough “married couples could be put up” to furnish a very good-sized dinner-table, and the bachelors (we like to put in a word for our fellow-sufferers) were as comfortably accommodated as their more fortunate associates, who travelled with wives, imperials, cap-boxes, and ladies’-maids.