Chapter XII: A Love Tale

I am obliged at this moment to interrupt the history of Innocent’s entrance into English life by the intrusion of another event which occurred quite suddenly, and without adequate preparation, a few days after the arrival of the traveller, and which threw Innocent for the moment altogether into the shade. It was not a deeply premeditated event, as perhaps it ought to have been, aiming as it did at such very important results, and affecting two lives in so momentous a way. On this particular afternoon there had been a flood of visitors at the Elms, such as now and then occurs without rhyme or reason--every acquaintance the Eastwoods possessed seeming to be moved by a unanimous impulse. From two o’clock until five the callers kept pouring in. On ordinary occasions one or two a day kept the house lively; this was one of those accidental floods which obey, as philosophers tell us, some fantastic law of their own, like the number of undirected letters put into the post-office. Two gentlemen arrived among the latest, both of whom had hoped to find the ladies alone, and who grinned and shook hands with each other, and told each other the news with the most delightful amiability, though their internal emotions were less sweet. They arrived together, and as the room was still tolerably full, they became each other’s companions, and stood in a corner talking with the most confidential aspect, after they had shaken hands with Mrs. Eastwood. Nelly was at the other extremity of the room, at the door-window which opened into the conservatory, talking to Sir Alexis Longueville, a man with a rent-roll as long as his name, whom both the gentlemen I have mentioned regarded with unfavourable feelings.

“What do you suppose people see in that old ass, Molyneux,” said Major Railton, “that everybody kootoos to him?”

“His money,” said Molyneux sententiously; and for ten minutes more these gentlemen crushed Sir Alexis under their heels as it were, and ground him into powder, though no feminine spite could be involved in their proceedings. He was not an old ass. He was a cynical middle-aged man of the world, who, notwithstanding his romantic name, had sustained a great many prosaic batterings and fierce encounters with the world. He had come to his fortune after his youth was over, and after he had learned to think badly enough of most people about him, an opinion which was not altered by the great social success he had when he reappeared as Sir Alexis, after a somewhat obscure and not much respected career as Colonel Longueville. It was now generally understood that this hero, the worse for the wear, was disposed to marry, and indeed was on the outlook for a suitable person to become Lady Longueville; a fact which his kind but vulgar sister Mrs. Barclay, who had married a millionaire, made known wherever she was received. He was “looking for a wife.” Major Railton and Mr. Molyneux in their corner were both aware of this fact, and both of them were extremely bitter upon Mrs. Eastwood for allowing him, as she did quite placidly, to stand talking to Nelly “for hours,” as Mr. Molyneux expressed it afterwards.

“What a pity that the best of women should be so mercenary!” he said to his companion.

“They will give anything for a handle to their names,” said the misanthropical Major, stroking his moustache, with discomfiture in his countenance. He had come with an estimate in his pocket for the work that had to be done at the stables, and had calculated on an hour at least of confidential talk.

And Nelly stood and talked to Sir Alexis, pointing out to him quite eagerly the different flowers that thrust their pretty heads against the glass, peering into the room. He knew about flowers. This innocent taste reigned strangely in his cynical bosom among many other inclinations much less praiseworthy. He laughed with Nelly over their Latin names, and told her stories about them and about his conservatories at Longueville. Perhaps he was not aware of the reckless way in which he was laying himself open to the remarks of the young men in the room, who did not leave him a shred of reputation to cover him, as they stood behind snarling to each other, and united in a common enmity. He was more amusing than either of them, and though he had no particular designs upon Nelly, he liked her fresh young face, and her interest in all that he said. Perhaps, too, a man who is aware of all the advantages of the youth which he has outlived, has a pleasure in proving himself more entertaining than younger men. He detained Nelly, and Nelly was not unwilling to be detained. She had perceived the entrance of the two at the end of the room, and rather, I fear, enjoyed their gloomy looks; or rather, she thought nothing whatever about Major Railton, but was guiltily glad to see the gloom on the countenance of young Molyneux.

“It will teach him to be full five days without calling,” she said to herself. She had not acknowledged even to herself that she was in love with young Molyneux, but she had an inward conviction that he was in love with her, and on the whole liked him for it. Is it not always a sign of good taste at least? Therefore she stood and talked to Sir Alexis, looking up brightly in his face, till he, who had no designs that way, was half subjugated, and asked himself suddenly whether Nelly Eastwood would not do? which was going a very long way. Time, however, and Mrs. Barclay’s horses, could not wait for ever, and at last the baronet was borne away.

“Come to me soon, Nelly dear, and finish what you have begun,” said that lady, whispering in her ear, as she took leave. Finish what she had begun! Nelly had no idea what she could mean.

By this time most of the visitors were gone, and Nelly, after a few minutes’ talk with the pair at the other end of the room, proceeded to execute some business which she had been kept from doing before. “I am sure Major Railton and Mr. Molyneux will excuse me,” she said, “but I must get my primroses now before any one else comes in----”

“I don’t think you will find any,” said Mrs. Eastwood, making her a sign to stay. But it was getting dark, and Nelly, who was perverse, pretended not to understand. Any pleasure she might have in the society of one of the two was neutralized by the presence of both, and perhaps there was even a thought in her mind that a young lover might take heart of grace and follow. In the conservatory her white-furred jacket and little flower-basket were lying on a chair. Before she could throw on the wrap Molyneux had joined her. “I think Railton has some business to talk about,” he said aloud, with a slight nod of concealed triumph to his adversary; “May I come upon the flower-gathering expedition? Gathering flowers by moonlight has quite a poetical sound.”

“It is too cold to be poetical,” said Nelly. There had been just enough between this girl and boy to give them both a thrill of the heart when they went, out of sight and hearing, into the stillness of the garden, where, indeed, to tell the truth, few primroses were as yet to be found. It was one of those lovely nights of early spring which sometimes succeed a boisterous day. The wind had fallen with the evening. The sky in the west was still full of colour, a pink flush extending far into the blue. The gorgeous sunset clouds had broken up, but this great rose-tinted pavilion still stood, spreading out its film of lovely colour over the house. On the garden side there was a stretch of clear sky, untinged by this dispersing veil of glory; clear, somewhat cold, pale, and luminous, with one star set in the midst of it; and separated from this blue bit of heaven by billows of fleecy cloud, a soft, clear young moon in her first quarter. It was cold, but to think of cold was impossible with such a heaven above them--impossible, at least, for these two, who were young, and who were together. They went along under the trees for some time without saying anything, except a little exclamation about the beauty of the sky.

“I am tired,” said Nelly at length; “I am so glad it is over. Calls are the stupidest of all things. If people would come in in the evening, as they do abroad--but English people will never understand.”

“Your visitors were not all stupid, I think,” said Molyneux, warming with the heat of combat.

“Oh no; Sir Alexis, for instance, was very amusing,” said Nelly, feeling by instinct what was coming, and defying her fate.

“You seemed to think so,” said the young man, with the loftiest tone of disinterested comment.

“And indeed I did think so; he is excellent company,” said the girl.

Thus the first parallels of warfare were opened. The pair went on quite beyond the bit of lawn where the primroses grew, and the red in the west stretched out as if to cover them, and the moon in the east looked down as if it were hanging over some battlement of heaven to watch. Nelly’s delicate nostrils had dilated a little with a sense of coming battle, and as for Molyneux, he held his head high like a war-horse.

“Yes, I am aware that ladies take that view sometimes; he is not popular among men,” he said, with lofty calm.

“I suppose men are jealous of him,” said Nelly. “Oh dear, yes, men are very jealous of each other. If you think a girl can have been out two seasons without perceiving that----”

“I am sorry we should have given you such a bad opinion of us. I am at a loss to understand,” said Mr. Molyneux solemnly, “what kind of creature the man could be who would be jealous of an old _roué_ like Longueville. His character is too well known among men, I assure you, Miss Eastwood, to make any such feeling possible.”

Nelly coloured with pride and shame. “He ought to have a label on him, then, to warn the ignorant. Not knowing what his crimes are, I cannot judge him; he is very amusing, that is all I know.”

“And that, of course, makes up for everything; and when any one ventures to warn you, Miss Eastwood, instead of listening, you turn your displeasure against the unfortunate man who feels it on his conscience----”

“Mr. Molyneux,” cried Nelly, quickly interrupting him, “I don’t know what right one gentleman, whom mamma knows, has to warn me against another. Mamma is the person to be spoken to if there is really anything to say.”

Thus the quarrel flashed and fizzed to the point of explosion; and what would have happened--whether they would have been driven apart in fragments, and their budding romance blown into dust and ruin in the ordinary course of events, had Molyneux responded in the same tone, I cannot say; but there are resources at the command of lovers which are not open to the general public. He did not go on in the same tone. He became suddenly lachrymose, as young men in love are permitted to be on occasion.

“Miss Eastwood,” he said dolefully, “there have been times when I have ventured to think that you would not quite place me on the same level with the last new-comer----”

“Oh, no,” said Nelly, with compunction, “I beg your pardon, that was not what I meant. We have known you a long time, Mr. Molyneux, and I am sure have always looked upon you as--a friend.”

“Well, as--a friend,” he said, in the same pathetic tone, “might I not be allowed to say something when I saw that you were being deceived? Dear Miss Eastwood, could I stand by, do you think, knowing all I do of you, and see a man making his way into your esteem under false pretences?”

“Making his way into my esteem?” cried Nelly with frank laughter. “Please don’t be so solemn. You can’t think surely for a moment that I _cared_ for that old Sir Alexis!”

“You are quite sure you don’t?” cried the lover, brightening up.

“Sure! Now didn’t I say it was all jealousy?” cried Nelly, laughing; but when she had said the words she perceived the meaning they might bear, and blushed violently, and stopped short, as people in embarrassing circumstances constantly do.

“You are quite right, as you always are,” said Molyneux, stopping too, and putting himself directly in front of her. If it were not that the women who are being proposed to are generally too much agitated to perceive it, a man about to propose has many very funny aspects. Young Molyneux placed himself directly in Nelly’s way; he stood over her, making her withdraw a step in self-defence. His face became long, and his eyes large. He put out his hands to take hers, if he could have got them. “Yes, you are right,” he said, more lachrymose than ever; “you are always right. I should be jealous of an angel if he came too near you. I am jealous of everybody. Won’t you say something? Won’t you give me your hand? I don’t care for anything in the world but you, or without you.”

“Mr. Molyneux!” cried Nelly, drawing a little back, with her heart beating and her cheeks burning, in the soft, starry twilight. He had got her hands somehow, in spite of her, and was advancing closer and closer. How unforeseen and unintended it all was! Neither of them had meant anything half-an-hour ago of this tremendous character. But Molyneux by this time felt sure that his life depended upon it, and that he had thought of nothing else for ages; and Nelly’s heart beat so loud that she thought it must be heard half a mile off, and feared it would leap away from her altogether. Their voices grew lower and lower, their shadows more confused in the young moonlight, which made at the most but a faint outline of shadow. There grew to be at last only a murmur under the bare branches, all knotted with the buds of spring, and only one blot of shade upon the path, which was softly whitened by that poetic light. This happened in the Lady’s Walk, which was on the other side of the lawn from the elm-trees, narrower, and quite arched and overshadowed with branches. The pink had scarcely gone out of the sky overhead, and the one star was still shining serenely in its luminous opening, when the whole business was over. You might have been in the garden without seeing, and, certainly, without hearing; but then matters were delightfully arranged for such interviews in the leafy demesne of The Elms.

“Oh, dear! I have forgotten my primroses,” said Nelly, “and what will they think of us in-doors?”

“Never mind; Railton has been very busy talking to your mother about bricks and slates,” said Molyneux, with a laugh of irrepressible triumph. They both laughed, which was mean of Nelly.

“Oh, hush! What has poor Major Railton to do with it?” she said. She was leaning against a lime-tree, a spot which she always remembered. It was cold, but neither of them felt it. Nelly’s little toes were half frozen, and she did not mind.

“Look! all the sunset is dying away,” said Molyneux. “It would not go, Nelly, till it knew how things were going to turn out. ‘Go not, happy day, from the shining fields----’”

“Don’t talk nonsense--you should say, from the sodden lawn,” said Nelly. “Let us get the primroses now, or what can I say to mamma?”

“We shall both have a great deal to say to her. She will never once think of the primroses, Nelly.”

“Oh, don’t call me ‘Nelly’ so loud; some one will hear you. Must we go and tell directly?” said the girl, with a half-whimper, which the foolish young man thought celestial. This to be said by Nelly, a girl who had never in all her life kept a secret half an hour from her mother! The fact was that she wanted to have the telling herself, and quaked at the thought of presenting this ardent personage to her mother, and probably having her dignity compromised before that mother’s very eyes by “some of his nonsense.” Nelly was very shy, and half ashamed of coming into the light and looking even her wooer himself in the face.

There were but a very few primroses, and these were half frozen, cowering among their leaves. Young Molyneux carried away a little cluster of them, and gave another to Nelly, which was not placed in her basket, and then they made another final round of the garden, and walked down the elm-tree avenue solemnly arm in arm. How quickly the mind gets accustomed to any revolution! This little concluding processional march threw them years in advance of the more agitating contiguity of the Lady’s Walk.

“This is how we shall walk about everywhere ten years hence, when we are sober old married people,” he said; and there glanced over the imaginations of both a sudden picture, which both would have been sadly disconcerted to have described. A little tremulous laugh went from one to the other. How much emotion that cannot express itself otherwise has vent in such soft laughter? And a sense of the calm of happiness to come, so different from this delightful dream of the beginning, yet issuing naturally from it, stole over them and stilled their young hearts.

This was what was going on in the garden while Major Railton, not without many a horrible thought of his rival’s advantages, was talking bricks and slates, as Molyneux flippantly said, to Mrs. Eastwood. They had come to the length of a pipe and water-butt for the rain-water, and the plumber’s estimate, when Nelly and Molyneux were gathering the primroses. How the gallant Major’s heart was being torn asunder in the midst of those discussions, I dare not attempt to describe. He had seated himself so that he could see into the garden; but the flicker of the firelight filled the room, and the Lady’s Walk was invisible from the windows.

“Don’t you think Miss Eastwood will catch cold? There is an east wind, I fear,” he said, in the very midst of the discussion about the plumber.

“I told Nelly to wrap herself up,” said Mrs. Eastwood, calmly. She was not afraid of the east wind. The Eastwoods had never been known to have any delicacy about the chest. And as for a more serious danger Nelly’s mother, secure in full possession of her child, had not even begun to think of that.

She was scarcely alarmed even when the two entered somewhat flushed and embarrassed, as soon as Major Railton, who, poor man, had an engagement, had withdrawn breathing fire and flame.

“What a colour you have, Nelly,” said Mrs. Eastwood innocently. “I suppose it is the wind. The Major tells me the wind is in the east. You should not have stayed out so long. Come to the fire and warm yourselves, both of you. I see you have got no primroses after all.”

“There were none,” said Nelly guiltily, putting her hand over the little cluster in her belt. “It is too cold for them; but I don’t think I ever was out on such a lovely night.”

“You have no idea how beautiful it is,” said young Molyneux--and then he took his leave in the most embarrassed way. When he clutched one of her hands and held it fast, and groped in the dark for the other, Nelly thanked heaven in mingled fright and gratitude that she had put a stop to his intention of at once telling her mother. What might he not have done before Mrs. Eastwood’s very eyes?

“But Nelly,” said the mother, when he was gone, “you should not have stayed so long out of doors. I don’t want to be absurd, or to put things into your head; but Ernest Molyneux is quite a young man, and very nice-looking, and just the sort of person to have stories made up about him--and really what object you could both have, wandering about on a cold night, except chatter and nonsense----”

Nelly was kneeling before the fire, warming her cold little fingers. At this address she sidled up to her mother’s side, and put her flushed cheek down on Mrs. Eastwood’s silken lap, and began with the most coaxing and melting of voices,--

“Mamma!”

It is not to be wondered at if an event like this happening quite suddenly and unexpectedly in an innocent young house which had not yet begun to afflict itself with love-stories should for the moment have eclipsed everything, and put the strange inmate and all the circumstances of her first appearance at once into the shade.