Bluebell / A Novel

by Mrs. G. C. Huddleston

"I have come to you, my dear aunt, as the kindest-hearted person I know. I am in an awful hole. But let me explain." And then he told how he had sold his troop to pay his debts, but had now, war being eminent, recalled his papers, and so owed all the over regulation money obtained in advance.

For once Du Meresq had a good case. Against her principles almost, Lady Susan listened, and, though pre-determined not to believe a thing he said, his words were making an impression.

"Of course I can get the money; but, going on active service, I should have to pay enormously for it. And, anyhow," he continued, "I thought I should like to say good-bye to you, whether you can let me have it or not."

Bertie's Irish blarney always peeped out in his dealings with women, and Lady Susan of late had been so unaccustomed to anything of the sort, that her heart began to warm to her scape-grace nephew. He was so distinguished-looking, too, with the beauty which comes of air and expression, and a certain winning manner, none of which were conspicuous attributes of the disciples of little Bethlehem. She made him stay to dinner, and Du Meresq, who thought things were looking up, gladly dismissed his Hansom, which had been imparting an unwonted appearance of dissipation to the locality for the last hour. He could make himself quite as agreeable to an old lady as a young one, and this one was a soldier's daughter, and Irish into the bargain. What wonder that her heart beat responsively and her blood fired at the idea of another of her race lending his life to his country! Bertie, to be sure, would have preferred not having to make capital of that, and objected strongly to being treated as a hero in advance. However, it was no use quarrelling with the means that had brought his aunt into so promising a frame of mind; and, before he left that evening, he had actually received the promise of a cheque to the amount of Mr. Green's claims in a few days.

Soon after this, he heard the welcome news that his regiment was ordered home immediately, evidently in consequence of the disturbances in the East. This caused Du Meresq great delight. His corps was, then, certain to be in it, and he would go into action with Lascelles and all his old friends, instead of exchanging into a strange regiment, as he had determined to do if his own were not for service.

With all this other thoughts were associated. Somehow he had never looked upon his rupture with Cecil Rolleston as final, having pretty well fathomed the motif of her renunciation of him, which he considered would bear explanation when occasion offered; but now, rather sadly reviewing the past, he said to himself that, after all, it was well for her they had not married.

I do not know that Cecil would have been of the same opinion. She had a brave spirit, that could bear up against known evils, but fretted and suffered in suspense. She was much altered since her illness. Once the most attentive and docile of daughters, she became irritable and uncertain in temper-difficile, as the French call it, or, according to a Scotch expression, "There was no doing with her" some days; and Mrs. Rolleston, unhappy about both Cecil and Bertie, looked upon her husband's prejudice against the latter as the cause of all this unsatisfactory state of things.

As to Colonel Rolleston, he was in the condition of a man whose "foes are those of his own household." No one appreciated more the "pillow of a woman's mind"; but really now the pillow might have been stuffed with stones, so many corners and angularities had developed themselves in his feminalities.

The regiment had been ordered to Quebec almost immediately after Bluebell had gone to England; and, as Mrs. Rolleston there heard of Evelyn Leighton's death, the fate of their protegée became naturally a subject of anxious speculation. Yet not a line had been received from her; and, after a time, the subject was avoided, for all felt that Bluebell had been ungrateful.

Then Mrs. Leighton wrote out the strange story of her elopement, and having since entered a family as governess in her maiden name. Mrs. Rolleston was painfully shocked; for, coupling it with the girl's silence, she could not but imagine the worst, especially when, as they gazed at each other in mute dismay, she read in Cecil's face a suspicion that Bertie had had some hand in her disappearance, he had not written either; but, unless he were in correspondence with Bluebell, could not have been aware that she was in England. Of course, therefore, it was only the wildest conjecture. Yet how could Cecil believe that a girl who had once cared for Bertie should so utterly have forgotten him as to sacrifice herself to any one else within a few weeks? But a letter from Du Meresq himself did much to banish these gathering doubts and suspicions. It appeared quite open and above-board, and was written to Mrs. Rolleston on the eve of embarking with his regiment for the Crimea. He mentioned one or two houses he had been staying in, related the successful visit to his aunt and wound up in a postcript with the words,—"Give my dearest love to Cecil, if she cares to have it."