All was very silent in the room. Then the widow quietly disengaged Jacko, and taking him up, went to the door, and deposited him outside. During her momentary absence, Lady Racial had time to touch the dead mans forehead with her lips, unseen.
CHAPTER III. THE DAUGHTERS OF THE SHEARS
Three daughters and a son were left to the world by Mr. Melchisedec. Love, well endowed, had already claimed to provide for the daughters: first in the shape of a lean Marine subaltern, whose days of obscuration had now passed, and who had come to be a major of that corps: secondly, presenting his addresses as a brewer of distinction: thirdly, and for a climax, as a Portuguese Count: no other than the Senor Silva Diaz, Conde de Saldar: and this match did seem a far more resplendent one than that of the two elder sisters with Major Strike and Mr. Andrew Cogglesby. But the rays of neither fell visibly on Lymport. These escaped Eurydices never reappeared, after being once fairly caught away from the gloomy realms of Dis, otherwise Trade. All three persons of singular beauty, a certain refinement, some Port, and some Presence, hereditarily combined, they feared the clutch of that fell king, and performed the widest possible circles around him. Not one of them ever approached the house of her parents. They were dutiful and loving children, and wrote frequently; but of course they had to consider their new position, and their husbands, and their husbands families, and the world, and what it would say, if to it the dreaded rumour should penetrate! Lymport gossips, as numerous as in other parts, declared that the foreign nobleman would rave in an extraordinary manner, and do things after the outlandish fashion of his country: for from him, there was no doubt, the shop had been most successfully veiled, and he knew not of Plutos close relationship to his lovely spouse.
The marriages had happened in this way. Balls are given in country towns, where the graces of tradesmens daughters may be witnessed and admired at leisure by other than tradesmen: by occasional country gentlemen of the neighbourhood, with light minds: and also by small officers: subalterns wishing to do tender execution upon mans fair enemy, and to find a distraction for their legs. The classes of our social fabric have, here and there, slight connecting links, and provincial public balls are one of these. They are dangerous, for Cupid is no respecter of class-prejudice; and if you are the son of a retired tea-merchant, or of a village doctor, or of a half-pay captain, or of anything superior, and visit one of them, you are as likely to receive his shot as any shopboy. Even masquerading lords at such places, have been known to be slain outright; and although Society allows to its highest and dearest to save the honour of their families, and heal their anguish, by indecorous compromise, you, if you are a trifle below that mark, must not expect it. You must absolutely give yourself for what you hope to get. Dreadful as it sounds to philosophic ears, you must marry. This, having danced with Caroline Harrington, the gallant Lieutenant Strike determined to do. Nor, when he became aware of her fathers occupation, did he shrink from his resolve. After a months hard courtship, he married her straight out of her fathers house. That he may have all the credit due to him, it must be admitted that he did not once compare, or possibly permit himself to reflect on, the dissimilarity in their respective ranks, and the step he had taken downward, till they were man and wife: and then not in any great degree, before Fortune had given him his majority; an advance the good soldier frankly told his wife he did not owe to her. If we may be permitted to suppose the colonel of a regiment on friendly terms with one of his corporals, we have an estimate of the domestic life of Major and Mrs. Strike. Among the garrison males, his comrades, he passed for a disgustingly jealous brute.
The ladies, in their pretty language, signalized him as a finick.
Now, having achieved so capital a marriage, Caroline, worthy creature, was anxious that her sisters should not be less happy, and would have them to visit her, in spite of her husbands protests.
There can be no danger, she said, for she was in fresh quarters, far from the nest of contagion. The lieutenant himself ungrudgingly declared that, looking on the ladies, no one for an instant could suspect; and he saw many young fellows ready to be as great fools as he had been another voluntary confession he made to his wife; for the candour of which she thanked him, and pointed out that it seemed to run in the family; inasmuch as Mr. Andrew Cogglesby, his rich relative, had seen and had proposed for Harriet. The lieutenant flatly said he would never allow it. In fact he had hitherto concealed the non-presentable portion of his folly very satisfactorily from all save the mess-room, and Mr. Andrews passion was a severe dilemma to him. It need scarcely be told that his wife, fortified by the fervid brewer, defeated him utterly. What was more, she induced him to be an accomplice in deception. For though the lieutenant protested that he washed his hands of it, and that it was a fraud and a snare, he certainly did not avow the condition of his wifes parents to Mr. Andrew, but alluded to them in passing as the country people. He supposed the country people must be asked, he said. The brewer offered to go down to them. But the lieutenant drew an unpleasant picture of the country people, and his wife became so grave at the proposal, that Mr. Andrew said he wanted to marry the lady and not the country people, and if she would have him, there he was. There he was, behaving with a particular and sagacious kindness to the raw lieutenant since Harriets arrival. If the lieutenant sent her away, Mr. Andrew would infallibly pursue her, and light on a discovery. Twice cursed by Love, twice the victim of tailordom, our excellent Marine gave away Harriet Harrington in marriage to Mr. Andrew Cogglesby.
Thus Joy clapped hands a second time, and Horror deepened its shadows.
From higher ground it was natural that the remaining sister should take a bolder flight. Of the loves of the fair Louisa Harrington and the foreign Count, and how she first encountered him in the brewers saloons, and how she, being a humorous person, laughed at his loaf for her, and wore the colours that pleased him, and kindled and soothed his jealousy, little is known beyond the fact that she espoused the Count, under the auspices of the affluent brewer, and engaged that her children should be brought up in the faith of the Catholic Church: which Lymport gossips called, paying the Devil for her pride.
The three sisters, gloriously rescued by their own charms, had now to think of their one young brother. How to make him a gentleman! That was their problem.
Preserve him from tailordomfrom all contact with tradethey must; otherwise they would be perpetually linked to the horrid thing they hoped to outlive and bury. A cousin of Mr. Melchisedecs had risen to be an Admiral and a knight for valiant action in the old war, when men could rise. Him they besought to take charge of the youth, and make a distinguished seaman of him. He courteously declined. They then attacked the married MarineNavy or Army being quite indifferent to them as long as they could win for their brother the badge of one Service, When he is a gentleman at once! they said, like those who see the end of their labours. Strike basely pretended to second them. It would have been delightful to him, of course, to have the tailors son messing at the same table, and claiming him when he pleased with a familiar Ah, brother! and prating of their relationship everywhere. Strike had been a fool: in revenge for it he laid out for himself a masterly career of consequent wisdom. The breweruxorious Andrew Cogglesbymight and would have bought the commission. Strike laughed at the idea of giving money for what could be got for nothing. He told them to wait.
In the meantime Evan, a lad of seventeen, spent the hours not devoted to his positive professionthat of gentlemanin the offices of the brewery, toying with big books and balances, which he despised with the combined zeal of the sucking soldier and emancipated tailor.
Two years passed in attendance on the astute brother-in-law, to whom Fortune now beckoned to come to her and gather his laurels from the pig-tails. About the same time the Countess sailed over from Lisbon on a visit to her sister Harriet (in reality, it was whispered in the Cogglesby saloons, on a diplomatic mission from the Court of Lisbon; but that could not be made ostensible). The Countess narrowly examined Evan, whose steady advance in his profession both her sisters praised.
Yes, said the Countess, in a languid alien accent. He has something of his fathers carriagesomething. Something of his deliveryhis readiness.
It was a remarkable thing that these ladies thought no man on earth like their father, and always cited him as the example of a perfect gentleman, and yet they buried him with one mind, and each mounted guard over his sepulchre, to secure his ghost from an airing.
He can walk, my dears, certainly, and talka little. Tete-a-tete, I do not say. I should think there he would bea stick! All you English are. But what sort of a bow has he got, I ask you? How does he enter a room? And, then his smile! his laugh! He laughs like a horseabsolutely! Theres no music in his smile. Oh! you should see a Portuguese nobleman smile. O mio Deus! honeyed, my dears! But Evan has it not. None of you English have. You go so.
The Countess pressed a thumb and finger to the sides of her mouth, and set her sisters laughing.
I assure you, no better! not a bit! I faint in your society. I ask myselfWhere am I? Among what boors have I fallen? But Evan is no worse than the rest of you; I acknowledge that. If he knew how to dress his shoulders properly, and to direct his eyesOh! the eyes! you should see how a Portuguese nobleman can use his eyes! Soul! my dears, soul! Can any of you look the unutterable without being absurd! You look so.
And the Countess hung her jaw under heavily vacuous orbits, something as a sheep might yawn.
But I acknowledge that Evan is no worse than the rest of you, she repeated. If he understood at all the management of his eyes and mouth! But thats what he cannot possibly learn in Englandnot possibly! As for your poor husband, Harriet! one really has to remember his excellent qualities to forgive him, poor man! And that stiff bandbox of a man of yours, Caroline! addressing the wife of the Marine, he looks as if he were all angles and sections, and were taken to pieces every night and put together in the morning. He may be a good soldiergood anything you willbut, Diacho! to be married to that! He is not civilized. None of you English are. You have no place in the drawing-room. You are like so many intrusive oxenabsolutely! One of your men trod on my toe the other night, and what do you think the creature did? Jerks back, then the half of him forwardI thought he was going to break in twothen grins, and grunts, Oh! m sure, beg pardon, m sure! I dont know whether he didnt say, MARM!
The Countess lifted her hands, and fell away in laughing horror. When her humour, or her feelings generally, were a little excited, she spoke her vernacular as her sisters did, but immediately subsided into the deliberate delicately-syllabled drawl.
Now that happened to me once at one of our great Balls, she pursued. I had on one side of me the Duchesse Eugenia de Formosa de Fontandigua; on the other sat the Countess de Pel, a widow. And we were talking of the ices that evening. Eugenia, you must know, my dears, was in love with the Count Belmarana. I was her sole confidante. The Countess de Pela horrible creature! Oh! she was the Duchesss determined enemy-would have stabbed her for Belmarana, one of the most beautiful men! Adored by every woman! So we talked ices, Eugenic and myself, quite comfortably, and that horrible De Pel had no idea in life! Eugenia had just said, This ice sickens me! I do not taste the flavour of the vanille. I answered, It is here! It mustit cannot but be here! You love the flavour of the vanille? With her exquisite smile, I see her now saying, Too well! it is necessary to me! I live on it!when up he came. In his eagerness, his foot just effleured my robe. Oh! I never shall forget! In an instant he was down on one knee it was so momentary that none saw it but we three, and done with ineffable grace. Pardon! he said, in his sweet Portuguese; Pardon! looking upthe handsomest man I ever beheld; and when I think of that odious wretch the other night, with his Oh! m sure, beg pardon, m sure! pon my honour! I could have kicked himI could, indeed!
Here the Countess laughed out, but relapsed into:
Alas! that Belmarana should have betrayed that beautiful trusting creature to De Pel. Such scandal! a duel!the Duke was wounded. For a whole year Eugenia did not dare to appear at Court, but had to remain immured in her country-house, where she heard that Belmarana had married De Pel! It was for her money, of course. Rich as Croesus, and as wicked as the black man below! as dear papa used to say. By the way, werent we talking of Evan? Ah,yes!
And so forth. The Countess was immensely admired, and though her sisters said that she was foreignized overmuch, they clung to her desperately. She seemed so entirely to have eclipsed tailordom, or Demogorgon, as the Countess was pleased to call it. Who could suppose this grand-mannered lady, with her coroneted anecdotes and delicious breeding, the daughter of that thing? It was not possible to suppose it. It seemed to defy the fact itself.
They congratulated her on her complete escape from Demogorgon. The Countess smiled on them with a lovely sorrow.
Safe from the whisper, my dears; the ceaseless dread? If you knew what I have to endure! I sometimes envy you. Pon my honour, I sometimes wish I had married a fishmonger! Silva, indeed, is a most excellent husband. Polished! such polish as you know not of in England. He has a waya wriggle with his shoulders in companyI cannot describe it to you; so slight! so elegant! and he is all that a woman could desire. But who could be safe in any part of the earth, my dears, while papa will go about so, and behave so extraordinarily? I was at dinner at your English embassy a month ago, and there was Admiral Combleman, then on the station off Lisbon, Sir Jackson Racials friend, who was the Admiral at Lymport formerly. I knew him at once, and thought, oh! what shall I do! My heart was like a lump of lead. I would have given worlds that we might one of us have smothered the other! I had to sit beside himit always happens! Thank heaven! he did not identify me. And then he told an anecdote of Papa. It was the dreadful old Bath story. I thought I should have died. I could not but fancy the Admiral suspected. Was it not natural? And what do you think I had the audacity to do? I asked him coolly, whether the Mr. Harrington he mentioned was not the son of Sir Abraham Harrington, of Torquay,the gentleman who lost his yacht in the Lisbon waters last year? I brought it on myself. Gentleman, maam,MAAM! says the horrid old creature, laughing, gentleman! hes a I cannot speak it: I choke! And then he began praising Papa. Diacho! what I suffered. But, you know, I can keep my countenance, if I perish. I am a Harrington as much as any of us!
And the Countess looked superb in the pride with which she said she was what she would have given her hand not to be. But few feelings are single on this globe, and junction of sentiments need not imply unity in our yeasty compositions.