John Halifax, Gentleman Read online

  “I have nothing to say against either you or your clothes,” replied I, smiling.

  “That’s all right; I beg to state, it is entirely in honour of you and of Enderley that I have slipped off my tan-yard husk, and put on the gentleman.”

  “You couldn’t do that, John. You couldn’t put on what you were born with.”

  He laughed—but I think he was pleased.

  We had now come into a hilly region. John leaped out and gained the top of the steep road long before the post-chaise 126did. I watched him standing, balancing in his hands the riding-whip which had replaced the everlasting rose-switch, or willow-wand, of his boyhood. His figure was outlined sharply against the sky, his head thrown backward a little, as he gazed, evidently with the keenest zest, on the breezy flat before him. His hair—a little darker than it used to be, but of the true Saxon colour still, and curly as ever—was blown about by the wind, under his broad hat. His whole appearance was full of life, health, energy, and enjoyment.

  I thought any father might have been proud of such a son, any sister of such a brother, any young girl of such a lover. Ay, that last tie, the only one of the three that was possible to him—I wondered how long it would be before times changed, and I ceased to be the only one who was proud of him.

  We drove on a little further, and came to the chief landmark of the high moorland—a quaint hostelry, called the “Bear.” Bruin swung aloft pole in hand, brown and fierce, on an old-fashioned sign, as he and his progenitors had probably swung for two centuries or more.

  “Is this Enderley?” I asked.

  “Not quite, but near it. You never saw the sea? Well, from this point I can show you something very like it. Do you see that gleaming bit in the landscape far away? That’s water—that’s our very own Severn, swelled to an estuary. But you must imagine the estuary—you can only get that tiny peep of water, glittering like a great diamond that some young Titaness has flung out of her necklace down among the hills.”

  “David, you are actually growing poetical.”

  “Am I? Well, I do feel rather strange to-day—crazy like; a high wind always sends me half crazy with delight. Did you ever feel such a breeze? And there’s something so gloriously free in this high level common—as flat as if my Titaness had found a little Mont Blanc, and amused herself with patting it down like a dough-cake.”

  127“A very culinary goddess.”

  “Yes! but a goddess after all. And her dough-cake, her mushroom, her flattened Mont Blanc, is very fine. What a broad green sweep—nothing but sky and common, common and sky. This is Enderley Flat. We shall come to its edge soon, where it drops abruptly into such a pretty valley. There, look down—that’s the church. We are on a level with the top of its tower. Take care, my lad,”—to the post-boy, who was crossing with difficulty the literally “pathless waste.”—“Don’t lurch us into the quarry-pits, or topple us at once down the slope, where we shall roll over and over—facilis descensus Averni—and lodge in Mrs. Tod’s garden hedge.”

  “Mrs. Tod would feel flattered if she knew Latin. You don’t look upon our future habitation as a sort of Avernus?”

  John laughed merrily. “No, as I told you before, I like Enderley Hill. I can’t tell why, but I like it. It seems as if I had known the place before. I feel as if we were going to have great happiness here.”

  And as he spoke, his unwonted buoyancy softened into a quietness of manner more befitting that word “happiness.” Strange word! hardly in my vocabulary. Yet, when he uttered it, I seemed to understand it and to be content.

  We wound a little way down the slope, and came in front of Rose Cottage. It was well named. I never in my life had seen such a bush of bloom. They hung in clusters—those roses—a dozen in a group; pressing their pinky cheeks together in a mass of family fragrance, pushing in at the parlour window, climbing up even to the very attic. There was a yellow jasmine over the porch at one front door, and a woodbine at the other; the cottage had two entrances, each distinct. But the general impression it gave, both as to sight and scent, was of roses—nothing but roses.

  “How are you, Mrs. Tod?” as a comely, middle-aged body appeared at the right-hand doorway, dressed sprucely in one 128of those things Jael called a “coat and jacket,” likewise a red calamanco petticoat tucked up at the pocket-holes.

  “I be pretty fair, sir—be you the same? The children ha’ not forgotten you—you see, Mr. Halifax.”

  “So much the better!” and he patted two or three little white heads, and tossed the youngest high up in the air. It looked very strange to see John with a child in his arms.

  “Don’t ’ee make more noise than ’ee can help, my lad,” the good woman said to our post-boy, “because, sir, the sick gentleman bean’t so well again to-day.”

  “I am sorry for it. We would not have driven up to the door had we known. Which is his room?”

  Mrs. Tod pointed to a window—not on our side of the house, but the other. A hand was just closing the casement and pulling down the blind—a hand which, in the momentary glimpse we had of it, seemed less like a man’s than a woman’s.

  When we were settled in the parlour John noticed this fact.

  “It was the wife, most likely. Poor thing! how hard to be shut up in-doors on such a summer evening as this!”

  It did seem a sad sight—that closed window, outside which was the fresh, balmy air, the sunset, and the roses.

  “And how do you like Enderley?” asked John, when, tea being over, I lay and rested, while he sat leaning his elbow on the window-sill, and his cheek against a bunch of those ever-intruding, inquisitive roses.

  “It is very, very pretty, and so comfortable—almost like home.”

  “I feel as if it were home,” John said, half to himself. “Do you know, I can hardly believe that I have only seen this place once before; it is so familiar. I seem to know quite well that slope of common before the door, with its black dots of furze-bushes. And that wood below; what a clear line its top makes against the yellow sky! There, that high ground to the right; it’s all dusky now, but it is such a view by daylight. And between it 129and Enderley is the prettiest valley, where the road slopes down just under those chestnut-trees.”

  “How well you seem to know the place already.”

  “As I tell you, I like it. I hardly ever felt so content before. We will have a happy time, Phineas.”

  “Oh, yes!” How—even if I had felt differently—could I say anything but “yes” to him then?

  I lay until it grew quite dark, and I could only see a dim shape sitting at the window, instead of John’s known face; then I bade him good-night, and retired. Directly afterwards, I heard him, as I knew he would, dash out of the house, and away up the Flat. In the deep quiet of this lonely spot I could distinguish, for several minutes, the diminishing sound of his footsteps along the loose, stony road; and the notes, clear and shrill, of his whistling. I think it was “Sally in our Alley,” or some such pleasant old tune. At last it faded far off, and I fell into sleep and dreams.

  130CHAPTER X

  “That Mrs. Tod is an extraordinary woman. I repeat it—a most extraordinary woman.”

  And leaning his elbows on the table, from which the said extraordinary woman had just removed breakfast, John looked over to me with his own merry brown eyes.

  “Wherefore, David?”

  “She has a house full of children, yet manages to keep it quiet and her own temper likewise. Astonishing patience! However people attain it who have to do with brats, I can’t imagine.”

  “John! that’s mean hypocrisy. I saw you myself half-an-hour ago holding the eldest Tod boy on a refractory donkey, and laughing till you could hardly stand.”

  “Did I?” said he, half-ashamed. “Well, it was only to keep the little scamp from making a noise under the windows. And that reminds me of another remarkable virtue in Mrs. Tod—she can hold her tongue.”

  “How so?”

  “In two whole days she has not communicated to us a
single fact concerning our neighbours on the other half of Rose Cottage.”

  “Did you want to know?”

  John laughingly denied; then allowed that he always had 131a certain pleasure in eliciting information on men and things.

  “The wife being indicated, I suppose, by that very complimentary word ‘thing.’ But what possible interest can you have in either the old gentleman or the old lady?”

  “Stop, Phineas: you have a bad habit of jumping at conclusions. And in our great dearth of occupation here, I think it might be all the better for you to take a little interest in your neighbours. So I’ve a great mind to indulge you with an important idea, suggestion, discovery. Harkee, friend!”—and he put on an air of sentimental mystery, not a bad copy of our old acquaintance, Mr. Charles—“what if the—the individual should not be an old lady at all?”

  “What! The old gentleman’s wife?”

  “Wife? Ahem! more jumping at conclusions. No; let us keep on the safe side, and call her the—individual. In short; the owner of that grey silk gown I saw hanging up in the kitchen. I’ve seen it again.”

  “The grey gown! when and where?”

  “This morning, early. I walked after it across the Flat, a good way behind, though; for I thought that it—well, let me say SHE—might not like to be watched or followed. She was trotting along very fast, and she carried a little basket—I fancy a basket of eggs.”

  “Capital housekeeper! excellent wife!”

  “Once more—I have my doubts on that latter fact. She walked a great deal quicker and merrier than any wife ought to walk when her husband is ill!”

  I could not help laughing at John’s original notions of conjugal duty.

  “Besides, Mrs. Tod always calls her invalid ‘the old gentleman!’ and I don’t believe this was an elderly lady.”

  “Nay, old men do sometimes marry young women.”

  “Yes, but it is always a pity; and sometimes not quite right. No,”—and I was amused to see how gravely and doggedly John 132kept to his point—“though this lady did not look like a sylph or a wood-nymph—being neither very small nor very slight, and having a comfortable woollen cloak and hood over the grey silk gown—still, I don’t believe she’s an old woman, or married either.”

  “How can you possibly tell? Did you see her face?”

  “Of course not,” he answered, rather indignantly. “I should not think it manly to chase a lady as a schoolboy does a butterfly, for the mere gratification of staring at her. I stayed on the top of the Flat till she had gone indoors.”

  “Into Rose Cottage?”

  “Why—yes.”

  “She had, doubtless, gone to fetch new-laid eggs for her—I mean for the sick gentleman’s breakfast. Kind soul!”

  “You may jest, Phineas, but I think she is a kind soul. On her way home I saw her stop twice; once to speak to an old woman who was gathering sticks; and again, to scold a lad for thrashing a donkey.”

  “Did you hear her?”

  “No; but I judge from the lad’s penitent face as I passed him. I am sure she had been scolding him.”

  “Then she’s not young, depend upon it. Your beautiful young creatures never scold.”

  “I’m not so sure of that,” said John, meditatively. “For my part, I should rather not cheat myself, or be cheated after that manner. Perfection is impossible. Better see the young woman as she really is, bad and good together.”

  “The young woman! The fair divinity, you mean!”

  “No;” shutting his mouth over the negative in his firm way—“I strongly object to divinities. How unpleasant it would be to woo an angel of perfection, and find her out at last to be only—only Mrs.—”

  “Halifax,” suggested I; at which he laughed, slightly colouring.

  133“But how woeful must be our dearth of subjects, when we talk such nonsense as this! What suggested it?”

  “Your friend in the grey gown, I suppose.”

  “Requiescat in Pace! May she enjoy her eggs! And now I must go saddle the brown mare, and be off to Norton Bury. A lovely day for a ride. How I shall dash along!”

  He rose up cheerily. It was like morning sunshine only to see his face. No morbid follies had ever tainted his healthy nature, whatsoever romance was there—and never was there a thoroughly noble nature without some romance in it. But it lay deep down, calm and unawakened. His heart was as light and free as air.

  Stooping over my easy chair, he wheeled it to the window, in sight of the pleasant view.

  “Now, Phineas, what more books do you want? You’ll take a walk before dinner? You’ll not be moping?”

  No; why should I, who knew I had always, whether absent or present, the blessing, the infinite blessing, of being first in his thoughts and cares? Who, whether he expressed it or not—the best things never are expressed or expressible—knew by a thousand little daily acts like these, the depth and tenderness of his friendship, his brotherly love for me. As yet, I had it all. And God, who knows how little else I had, will pardon, if in my unspeakable thankfulness lurked a taint of selfish joy in my sole possession of such a priceless boon.

  He lingered about, making me “all right,” as he called it, and planning out my solitary day. With much merriment, too, for we were the gayest couple of young bachelors, when, as John said, “the duties of our responsible position” would allow.

  “Responsible position! It’s our good landlady who ought to talk about that. With two sets of lodgers, a husband, and an indefinite number of children. There’s one of them got into mischief at last. Hark!”

  134“It’s Jack, my namesake. Bless my life! I knew he would come to grief with that donkey. Hey, lad! never mind. Get up again.”

  But soon he perceived that the accident was more serious; and disappeared like a shot, leaping out through the open window. The next minute I saw him carrying in the unlucky Jack, who was bleeding from a cut in the forehead, and screaming vociferously.

  “Don’t be frightened, Mrs. Tod; it is very slight—I saw it done. Jack, my lad!—be a man, and never mind it. Don’t scream so; you alarm your mother.”

  But as soon as the good woman was satisfied that there was no real cause for terror, hers changed into hearty wrath against Jack for his carelessness, and for giving so much trouble to the gentleman.

  “But he be always getting into mischief, sir—that boy. Three months back, the very day Mr. March came, he got playing with the carriage-horse, and it kicked him and broke his arm. A deal he cares: he be just as sprack as ever. As I say to Tod—it bean’t no use fretting over that boy.”

  “Have patience,” answered John, who had again carried the unfortunate young scapegrace from our parlour into Mrs. Tod’s kitchen—the centre room of the cottage; and was trying to divert the torrent of maternal indignation, while he helped her to plaster up the still ugly looking wound. “Come, forgive the lad. He will be more sorry afterwards than if you had punished him.”

  “Do’ee think so?” said the woman, as, struck either by the words, the manner, or the tone, she looked up straight at him. “Do’ee really think so, Mr. Halifax?”

  “I am sure of it. Nothing makes one so good as being forgiven when one has been naughty. Isn’t it so, Jack, my namesake?”

  “Jack ought to be proud o’ that, sir,” said the mother, respectfully; 135“and there’s some sense in what you say, too. You talk like my man does, o’ Sundays. Tod be a Scotchman, Mr. Halifax; and they’re good folks, the Scotch, and read their Bibles hard. There’s a deal about forgiving in the Bible; isn’t there, sir?”

  “Exactly,” John answered, smiling. “And so, Jack, you’re safe this time; only you must not disobey your mother again, for the sake of donkeys or anything else.”

  “No, sir—thank’ee, sir,” sobbed Jack, humbly. “You be a gentleman—Mr. March bean’t—he said it served me right for getting under his horses.”

  “Hold thy tongue!” said Jack’s mother, sharply; for the latch of the opposite door was just then lifted,
and a lady stood there.

  “Mrs. Tod; my father says—”

  Seeing strangers, the lady paused. At the sound of her voice—a pleasant voice, though somewhat quick and decided in tone—John and I both involuntarily turned. We felt awkward! doubtful whether to stay or retire abruptly. She saved us the choice.

  “Mrs. Tod, my father will take his soup at eleven. You will remember?”

  “Yes, Miss March.”

  Upon which, Miss March shut the door at once, and vanished.

  She wore a grey silken gown. I glanced at John, but he did not see me, his eyes were fixed on the door, which had disclosed and concealed the momentary picture. Its momentariness impressed it the more vividly on my memory—I have it there still.

  A girl, in early but not precocious maturity, rather tall, of a figure built more for activity and energy than the mere fragility of sylph-like grace: dark-complexioned, dark-eyed, dark-haired—the whole colouring being of that soft darkness of tone which gives a sense of something at once warm and tender, 136strong and womanly. Thorough woman she seemed—not a bit of the angel about her. Scarcely beautiful; and “pretty” would have been the very last word to have applied to her; but there was around her an atmosphere of freshness, health, and youth, pleasant as a breeze in spring.

  For her attire, it was that notable grey silk gown—very simply made, with no fripperies or fandangos of any sort—reaching up to her throat and down to her wrists, where it had some kind of trimming of white fur, which made the skin beneath show exquisitely delicate.

  “That is Miss March,” said our landlady, when she had disappeared.

  “Is it?” said John, removing his eyes from the shut door.

  “She be very sensible-like, for a young body of seventeen; more sensible and pleasanter than her father, who is always ailing, and always grumbling. Poor gentleman!—most like he can’t help it. But it be terrible hard for the daughter—bean’t it, sir?”

  “Very,” said John. His laconism was extraordinary.

  Still he kept standing by the kitchen-table, waiting till the last bandage had been sewn on Jack’s cut forehead, and even some minutes after his protege had begun playing about as usual. It was I who had to suggest that we should not intrude in Mrs. Tod’s kitchen any longer.