“To the curés and their vicars, Monsieur,” she said gravely, “who will distribute it—they know every one so well!” Sir Godfrey mused.
“And you live near us!” he said, thinking of his own daughter, as he asked her name.
“It is Aimée—and my brother is Armand de l’Orme, an officer at Versailles. We are orphans, Armand and I, and we do not belong to Paris. We were both born in the south, in Provence—Were you ever in Provence, Monsieur—ah, how much more beautiful it is!” With an air of empressement she clasped her hands, and standing there in the quietly sunny street, while the stream of the populous chaussée passed athwart its end, the girl seemed to forget her impatient company beyond, whose whispers and exclamations at last betrayed them to the surprised glance of Sir Godfrey. “Was she allowed,” he asked, however, “to make visits from her convent—for he had a daughter, little older than herself, who had no companions of her own age in Paris.” And the young quêteuse responded eagerly to the hint. “Oh, yes—she was allowed—on certain days—and she would positively come. Indeed—perhaps—mademoiselle herself would assist at their quête.”
The baronet shook his head, almost starting in his saddle at the thought. But it struck him suddenly that his oddly-made new acquaintance, through her friends the curés, might aid him in discovery of the missing Suzanne Deroux; and she was all readiness and sanguine expectation when he explained the matter. There was one young vicar in particular, so mild, so missionnaire, so apostolique, whose acquaintance with all the poorer quarters was miraculous: she would be able to bring the news, she was sure, very soon indeed. So giving her, at her request, the same paper he had recalled from his banker, Sir Godfrey saw her rejoin her archway amidst the impatient welcome of her companions, and took his way into the Rue Debilly, with a feeling half-amused, half-meditative.
At home, there were fresh letters and newspapers awaiting him, with the dinner-time, unwontedly late. There had been already the expected tidings from Francis to his mother, though brief, that he was finally free of term-times, having reached London, which he was ready to leave next week; his father’s remaining business there seemed fully settled, but he was to dine, before starting, at their friend the solicitor’s, and bring over with him everything wanted. He enclosed his sister’s letter, however, from her dearest school-fellow, crossed and recrossed, with all its precious gossip for common use, its inexpressible sentiments that were not to be seen by another creature, and its postscript with the sole piece of real, intelligible information. Mrs Mason’s correspondence also, whose contents had at no time been breathed to any one, had been forwarded: while Sir Godfrey himself had a packet from Mr Hesketh’s office in Exeter, giving on the whole satisfactory prospects, and containing a few papers from among the late Sir John’s dreary mass of lumber; hitherto overlooked, but which he might care to examine. They were for the most part unimportant, but he saw, from the first glance at one of them, that had it arrived that morning, it might have simply saved him a little trouble and uncertainty; as it was a French letter of date not long before his brother’s death, evidently written by some humble notary’s clerk, to state the case of the Suzanne in question, who had received a pension for an injury received while in his service, probably interrupted through the change of abode by her children, whose work supported them; but her son had been ill, and the winter severe; the application had been rather made at the penman’s instance, as he lived au quatrième in the house where their attic was, and had himself discovered the address by going to the banker’s, where he had obtained no other prospect. It stated the place and number distinctly, and had in all likelihood led to the memorandum of Sir John,—though no doubt thrown aside at the moment, and with his confused mind in those latter days, so busy amidst out-door matters or convivial meetings, its chief point had been forgotten.
Joining in the eager table-talk it had all excited, with a mind at rest, the baronet could fully share the pleasure of home-thoughts: the very atmosphere of the room seemed English, for all its bare waxed floor and patch of carpet, its airy paper-hangings of pastoral scenes, its light curtains and tall glaring windows with flimsy frames, its stove-filled chimney-place, and the white folding-doors of its antechamber, about all which there lurked no corner of substantial comfort, as round the wainscot and panelling, the recesses and embayments, corner-cupboards, and hearth-places, and presses of home, with its high-backed arm-chair, noiseless floors, and family pictures: the sound of the convent-bell, and Sir Godfrey’s account of his pretty little quêteuse, alone brought back their recollection. It had been long since Lady Willoughby saw her husband so cheerful, even when he turned to his newspaper, and sat absorbed in its varied matter, leaning back on that hard diminutive sofa;—Mrs Mason, as her custom was, has withdrawn to the mysterious privacy of her own apartment; Mr Thorpe, to a book, apart in the wide naked antechamber; while at its further windows, looking out, sit the two young people in their unwearied charge of the street;—till, as that after-dinner repose steals through the sitting-room, with cool shade from the early May twilight, she feels instinctively that his old easy habit of middle age has returned on him, the first time since reaching France—nay, on second thought, since the day of that melancholy message from Devonshire—of sinking at that hour into a doze. It scarce needs her turning her head, to see how the affairs and concerns of the world at large have fallen from his mind; while gently netting on, without word or other motion, perhaps with no particular thought besides, she sits quiet that it may last the longer. It had seemed vague, in its connection with a trifle; but neither she nor he could have told the indescribable relief it had given him to find the only singularity in Sir John’s memoranda cleared up; in this commonplace way, too, when even casual circumstances had seemed joining to give it a feverish importance. That intended but ineffectual will of his, by which he had evidently contemplated a formal bequest, with those slight exceptions, of everything to the colonel, already his legal heir, could after all have had no rational motive; it was probably but one of those strangely groundless suspicions, those longings to exercise influence from the very tomb, which cross an unsound mind. The colonel had not been unconscious of the superior abilities of his eldest brother, nor of the still brighter parts which were attributed to his brother John in early life; he only felt reassured by the conviction, again confirmed, that the unhappy results of his foolish match had been such as to touch his brain with insanity. There was a vulgar old story about their family, in fact—a sort of absurd country superstition—that owing to some ancient ancestral impiety, even when the ghost ceased to be heard of in the long portrait-gallery at Stoke, over the great staircase—which had been invisible to the family alone—then somewhere or other a Willoughby was mad. Often had the colonel smiled at it, when merely a younger brother in the army; a wound once received in his head in America, which had cost him delirious days and nights, seemed formerly to entitle him doubly to his smile at the corroboration, when restored to full health: nay, from some cause, he had found himself thinking of it once or twice in the full blaze of the streets of Paris, with their vivid reminiscences—though his smile had been but faint, now he was the younger brother no longer. For why, really, after all, had he come to Paris in particular, or lingered there, persuading himself under so many different forms about its convenience, the novelty to his children, the advantage of his brother’s banker, the little legacy, the comparative privacy, the rapid post, or the many notices of places to let? Why, in that indirect way, had he sought to make inquiries of the police, and caught himself listening to words in the street, of unknown suicides, baffled investigations, and French ennui? Why had he mechanically shrunk from the Boulevards and rushing St Honoré, yet glanced askance at windows full of faces, or looked again with an irresistible suspicion, to see if he recognised or was recognised by any one—not merely on that day, but on previous ones also? Actually, in the hot, beating sun, it had for a moment or two resembled the preface to his fever in the colonies, after that affair with their rabble of militia, among whom he had fancied he saw a known visage disguised; and the strong effort of his understanding which recovered him had only brought more keenly the sudden question—whether his brother indeed, or he himself, had been touched with the germs of a growing madness. There had been strange horror in the thought. For, had there really been a deliberate, sober meaning in his brother’s stray purposes, through the confusion of all his neglect, and though cut off by death? While the quick, clear self-suspicion had seemed to pierce his own mind with shame, how, amidst an uneasiness to associate with his countrymen, he was still traversing Paris everywhere, under cover of guidance to his family, mingling private anxieties with the grandeur of royal edifices, and continuing to expect some chance vestige of things which his brother might have chosen wisely to leave in silence. Since his succession to Stoke he must have been altering insensibly. Even selfish feelings, impatient wishes, hidden thoughts, or half-fretful expressions towards her who had been so long his solace, had then recurred to mind with a painful surprise; compared with which, his brother’s eccentricity appeared innocent indeed, sadly as his earlier follies had brought it on. And had he heard before from Mr Hesketh what he learned from the letter on his return, that the manor-house and park were unlikely to be soon let, or to bring any profitable addition to the rents at present, from a fresh and growing rumour that they were haunted, it would have startled him with a superstitious feeling far more oppressive than any at Stoke. But, as it was, with a sober return to accustomed thoughts, calmed by his unwonted self-scrutiny, for him so deep—and soothed by gentle presence—Sir Godfrey slipped from his practical, matter-of-fact English newspaper to repose; though with the melancholy conviction that his brother’s understanding had indeed partially given way. They had not latterly seen very much of each other: John was now at peace; his fruitless life had come to an end. The baronet was awoke only by the rustling entrance of Mrs Mason to pour out the chocolate—Mr Thorpe’s awkward haste to set her chair—the bringing in of wax-lights—the pause before grace was said, with the tutor’s devout formality. The evening talk was as duly closed by Mr Thorpe’s reading of the appointed prayers—another advantage never gained by Lady Willoughby till their departure abroad required a tutor.
As if there were not strange noises dying far and wide through the city, till across the river could be heard the great clock of the Invalides. As if the atmosphere of the world were not at that hour infected with inscrutable sympathies and mysterious desires; which gathered in Paris, as after long heat that malady of the air, felt keenly by the lower creatures: so that it might have been working vaguely even with Sir Godfrey. And as if, though clouded and stagnant, even well-nigh lost, the judgment of the departed might not have exercised some acute thought—deeper even than the sharpest lawyer could track it.
So quiet, after prayers, was the outer night over the bare roofs, and lights, and distant pinnacles of the city—the glimpse of the river, the lamps on the bridge, the trees of the Champ de Mars—and so wide with its floating films of fair May-cloud, softening the few stars—that Rose Willoughby shaded her candle to peep out at it, lifting the blind, and putting her face close to the window-glass, after she had said her prayers, and was half ready to go to bed. Listening to Mrs Mason’s steps in the next room, extinguisher in hand, lest her door should suddenly be opened to that lady’s most indignant surprise—Rose thought still of to-morrow’s drive toward Versailles.
CHAPTER V.—FALLING FLEUR-DE-LYS.
“Quel triste abaissement!