This constituted the village proper; but a little aloof from it—being in it but not of it, as it were—there were in all perhaps half a dozen residences of a somewhat more pretentious kind. There was the rectory, for instance, on the opposite side of the road, eastward of the church, built in the very centre of its extensive garden, and snugly surrounded on all sides by high stone walls. Then there was Stoke House, near the rectory, standing well back from the road, embowered in trees, and with a carriage-drive running straight up through its beautiful rose-garden to the front door. Nearer the beach, and on the opposite side of the valley, was “Verbena Cottage,” the abode of Lieutenant Bobus, in command of the coast-guard; and still nearer the beach, some ten or a dozen yards back from the road, enclosed within a neat paling, sheltered by lofty trees, with a lovely flower-garden in front and an extensive fruit and kitchen-garden in the rear, stood “Sea View,” a small but well-built house, in which resided the relict and daughter of the late “Cap’n” Walford.
The late “Cap’n” Walford had been a wonderfully popular man in his day; and his memory was greatly esteemed and revered by the villagers. Manifesting, at an early age, a love of enterprise and excitement quite extraordinary even in an Alverstoke man, he had seized the first opportunity which offered to become the owner of a very fine fast-sailing lugger, in which, during his thirty years of devotion to maritime pursuits, he, by a rare combination of prudence and audacity, gradually acquired the reputation of being a most successful smuggler—and the snug little fortune of some ten thousand pounds. The latter and more desirable portion of his acquirements he carefully invested, as it dribbled in bit by bit, in house-property in the neighbourhood; so that, when this estimable man’s career was cut short at the comparatively early age of sixty years, by an unlucky cannon-shot fired from a revenue cutter, his disconsolate relict found herself the possessor of a comfortable income amounting to some five hundred pounds per annum, together with “Sea View” and—last, but by no means least—a daughter, fourteen years of age. This melancholy event occurred four years before the date at which this history opens; Lucy Walford was therefore about eighteen years old when the first of that train of events happened which it is herein proposed to record.
Mrs Walford was wont to assert, just about this time, that Lucy was the very living picture of what she herself used to be when a girl. If this was indeed true, it was at once an evidence of that remarkable good taste which the late “cap’n” was said to have possessed, and of the extraordinary changes effected by the hand of Time, for no one could ever have suspected such a resemblance without Mrs Walford’s assurance. The old lady was a sad and subdued personage, thin and angular of figure and face, with prominent cheek-bones, eye-brows, and chin, dark eyes, deeply sunk in their sockets, a broad forehead, ploughed with innumerable wrinkles, a long sharp aquiline nose, a large thin-lipped mouth, and a querulous temper.
Lucy, on the other hand, was of medium height, slight, graceful figure, abounding in delicate curves, with small hands and feet, an exquisite complexion, a face, the sweet piquant loveliness of which set all the youth of Alverstoke—and Gosport too, for that matter—by the ears, a wealth of long silky golden hair, which persisted in twisting itself into a most distracting conglomeration of wavy curls, and a temper which nothing—not even her mother’s querulousness—could ruffle.
That Lucy should be fairly beset by suitors was only natural. There was not a single bold young smuggler of marriageable age in all the country round about who did not cherish in a greater or lesser degree the fond hope of one day making her his own, albeit most of them were—it is only just to say—dimly cognisant of the fact that she was much too good for the best of them. It was probably in consequence of this feeling that only one or two—the boldest of the bold of this dashing fraternity—had, so far, mustered up the courage to approach the young lady with a distinct proposal of marriage; and these, it is hardly necessary to say, had been firmly, but as pleasantly as possible, sent to the right-about. This class of lovers gave Lucy no trouble whatever; bold as they might be in the pursuit of their lawless avocation, they were diffident to the verge of absurdity in the presence of beauty, if associated with dignity and refinement; they were painfully conscious of their uncouth bearing and manners; and Lucy had little difficulty in keeping them at a proper distance.
But if these admirers gave her no trouble, there were others—notably two—who did; quite enough, in fact, to fully compensate for the ease with which she was able to manage all the rest. One of these was a certain Lieutenant Walford, a cousin of Lucy’s; the other being Captain George Leicester, of the merchant schooner Industry.
Edward Walford was the only son of a half-brother of the late Captain Walford. He was an orphan, twenty-three years of age, and held a commission in his Majesty’s—foot, then quartered in Gosport. He was fairly well educated, tall, passably good-looking, of engaging manners, but—those who knew him best said—treacherous, unscrupulous, and a gamester.
George Leicester, on the other hand, whilst perhaps quite as handsome as his rival, was simply a frank, honest, sturdy seaman, carrying his heart upon his sleeve; thoroughly master of his profession, but diffident and doubtful of himself in all other matters.
The trouble with these two was, that Walford could not be made to see that his presence was distasteful to Lucy; whilst Leicester was provokingly blind to the fact that the fair girl loved him with all her pure, simple little heart. She had not given her love to him unsought, it must be understood—far from it; George Leicester had been one of the earliest, as he was one of her most constant and devoted, admirers; he was unremitting in his attentions to her whenever he was in port; but the simple fellow was so doubtful as to his prospects of success that he had never given Lucy the chance, which she would so gladly have welcomed, to say “Yes” to the momentous question which was ever hovering upon his lips, but had never yet been able to get beyond them.
It was on a certain brilliant June afternoon that Lucy, as was her frequent custom, took a book in her hand and strolled down to the beach, where, making a little nest for herself in the shingle, she sat down to read or think, as the whim might take her.