Sentimental? And, after all, why not? For who am I to condemn sentiment, which, if it contain no corrupt and morbid elements, is surely the strongest driving power towards noble deeds and heroical ventures human history can show? To decry or fear sentiment is to decry or fear the finest achievements of art, of literature, of romance, I had almost said of religion itself—all that, in short, upon which spirit, as distinct from matter, feeds and thrives.
And this, quite naturally if not quite obviously, brings me back to the year Hartover was up at Cambridge. During the few days I spent there myself, while making my peace with the members of the deserted reading party and, to some extent, with the good Master himself, I contrived to find time for an afternoon at Westrea. Nellie Braithwaite must hear something of all which had lately happened; yet to inform her by letter appeared to me inadvisable. I did not approve of carrying on any sort of correspondence behind her father’s back. I must not raise hopes which might never be realised; but I might, without indiscretion, let her know Hartover was not only free, but fired, through that same freedom, with liberal ideas and worthy purposes—let her know, further, I had been faithful to my promise, and had thrown in my lot with the dear boy’s for good and all, so that nothing short of rejection on his part would make me leave him again.
But I speedily perceived, with mingled shame and admiration, any fear of raising undue hopes was quite uncalled for. I had underrated alike the courage and sensibility of Nellie Braithwaite’s nature. For her gladness at my news was veiled by a sweet reserve both of expression and inquiry—assurance of Hartover’s well-being bringing all her maidenly dignity into play. Henceforth, as I saw, she would wrap her love about with silence, hiding it even from me, her chosen friend, in delicate yet lofty pride. No finger would she raise to beckon Hartover or recall that early love passage; while, as I also saw, my presence in future would be less acceptable to her because, from my closeness to Hartover, I formed, in a measure, a link between him and herself.
I left Westrea, on my return journey to Cambridge, somewhat crestfallen. As reward of my zeal in fulfilling—and successfully, moreover—the promise I gave her, was I to be exiled from her confidence? That seemed arbitrary and, indeed, a little unjust. Whereupon I made a reflection—made how many thousand times already by how many thousands of my sex!—that the ways of woman, be she pure and noble or, alas! signally the reverse, are one and all mysterious, past forecasting and past finding out.
And at that I had to leave it. For Hartover, on his part, spoke no word, gave no sign. Hover, the moors, the stables, the kennels, and, as I observed with satisfaction, so much of the varied business of the great property as he could get in touch with, filled his time and mind to the exclusion of all question of—in his own phrase—‘petticoats.’ Was Nellie Braithwaite forgotten then? Once again I must be stern with myself; for how should it advantage me even if she was?
But specially did stables and kennels bulk big among the dear boy’s many interests and occupations during that pleasant long vacation, whereby Warcop was made the happiest of men. For one morning, about a fortnight after our arrival, Hartover threw a letter to me across the breakfast table.
‘Read that,’ he said. ‘The Rusher signs his abdication—gives up the hounds, moves his horses—or what he is pleased to call his—I think I know who has paid for them and their keep for a good dozen years now—and hunts in Leicestershire this winter. My father must not, of course, be worried, so her Magnificence forwards the letter to me. Really, it strikes me as rather pathetic, Brownlow. How are the mighty fallen! But, pathetic or not, the hounds must be hunted this season or the mouth of our enemy—Bramhall, to wit—will be altogether too extensively enlarged over us.—Oh! well, if it comes to that, I suppose I can hunt them well enough myself, with Warcop’s help, putting in a day every fortnight or so from Cambridge during term time. I’ll back myself to be a popular master before the end of the winter, though there will be prejudices to live down, no doubt. Gad! so much the better—carrière ouverte aux talents. After all, I can canoodle and coax against most people, you know, and be nine foot high, too, when I like.’
Which was perfectly true. Had I not experience thereof? I fell in with this idea the more readily since our English institution of fox-hunting plays so large a part in country life, bringing landlord and tenant together on equal terms, and establishing a friendly and wholesome relation invaluable as between class and class. Mastership of the Hover, though infringing somewhat upon the routine of his college work, was in my opinion calculated to prove an excellent introduction to those larger and immensely more important forms of mastership which, for Hartover, seemed to loom up by no means far ahead.
But creaking gates hang long, the proverb says. And this proved true of the invalid at Bath. The months passed, and yet Lord Longmoor, though increasingly fanciful, increasingly querulous, increasingly a sick man, in truth, still kept a feeble hold of life through autumn, winter, spring, and on into the golden heats of midsummer. The May term again drew to its close, and with it Hartover’s sojourn at Cambridge. How had the university affected and influenced him? Chiefly, I believed, as a pause, a place of recovery before further effort. Out of the great world he had come, surfeited by all too heavy a meal—for one of his age—of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Back into the great world, it was ordained, he must return. But he had rested by the way, had slept off the effects, so to speak, of that over-much and evil fruit-eating, had at once steadied and grown younger.
Meanwhile he was the darling of the college; where, from the good Master, through ranks of dons and gownsmen, down to gyps and bed-makers, he was an object of interest and of admiration. And this less from snobbery, the vulgar spirit—too common among us—which ‘loves a lord,’ than from his own charm and grace and the irresistible way he had with him. The affection he inspired and interest he excited, touched and amused him, when he happened to be conscious of it; but his eyes, so I fancied, were set on something beyond, and as the time of departure drew near I seemed to observe in him a growing preoccupation and restlessness.