Book: Alice, or The Mysteries, Book II
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Edward Bulwer Lytton >> Alice, or The Mysteries, Book II
Produced by Dagny, dagnypg@yahoo.com
and David Widger, widger@cecomet.net
BOOK II.
"The hour arrived--years having rolled away
When his return the Gods no more delay.
Lo! Ithaca the Fates award; and there
New trials meet the Wanderer."
HOMER: _Od._ lib. i, 16.
CHAPTER I.
THERE is continual spring and harvest here--
Continual, both meeting at one time;
For both the boughs do laughing blossoms bear,
And with fresh colours deck the wanton prime;
And eke at once the heavy trees they climb,
Which seem to labour under their fruit's load.
SPENSER: _The Garden of Adonis_.
Vis boni
In ipsa inesset forma.*--TERENCE.
* "Even in beauty there exists the power of virtue."
BEAUTY, thou art twice blessed; thou blessest the gazer and the
possessor; often at once the effect and the cause of goodness! A sweet
disposition, a lovely soul, an affectionate nature, will speak in the
eyes, the lips, the brow, and become the cause of beauty. On the other
hand, they who have a gift that commands love, a key that opens all
hearts, are ordinarily inclined to look with happy eyes upon the
world,--to be cheerful and serene, to hope and to confide. There is more
wisdom than the vulgar dream of in our admiration of a fair face.
Evelyn Cameron was beautiful,--a beauty that came from the heart, and
went to the heart; a beauty, the very spirit of which was love! Love
smiled on her dimpled lips, it reposed on her open brow, it played in the
profuse and careless ringlets of darkest yet sunniest auburn, which a
breeze could lift from her delicate and virgin cheek; Love, in all its
tenderness, in all its kindness, its unsuspecting truth,--Love coloured
every thought, murmured in her low melodious voice, in all its symmetry
and glorious womanhood. Love swelled the swan-like neck, and moulded the
rounded limb.
She was just the kind of person that takes the judgment by storm: whether
gay or grave, there was so charming and irresistible a grace about her.
She seemed born, not only to captivate the giddy, but to turn the heads
of the sage. Roxalana was nothing to her. How, in the obscure hamlet of
Brook-Green, she had learned all the arts of pleasing it is impossible to
say. In her arch smile, the pretty toss of her head, the half shyness,
half freedom, of her winning ways, it was as if Nature had made her to
delight one heart, and torment all others.
Without being learned, the mind of Evelyn was cultivated and well
informed. Her heart, perhaps, helped to instruct her understanding; for
by a kind of intuition she could appreciate all that was beautiful and
elevated. Her unvitiated and guileless taste had a logic of its own: no
schoolman had ever a quicker penetration into truth, no critic ever more
readily detected the meretricious and the false. The book that Evelyn
could admire was sure to be stamped with the impress of the noble, the
lovely, or the true!
But Evelyn had faults,--the faults of her age; or, rather, she had
tendencies that might conduce to error. She was of so generous a nature
that the very thought of sacrificing her self for another had a charm.
She ever acted from impulse,--impulses pure and good, but often rash and
imprudent. She was yielding to weakness, persuaded into anything, so
sensitive, that even a cold look from one moderately liked cut her to the
heart; and by the sympathy that accompanies sensitiveness, no pain to her
was so great as the thought of giving pain to another. Hence it was that
Vargrave might form reasonable hopes of his ultimate success. It was a
dangerous constitution for happiness! How many chances must combine to
preserve to the mid-day of characters like this the sunshine of their
dawn! The butterfly that seems the child of the summer and the
flowers--what wind will not chill its mirth, what touch will not brush
away its hues?
CHAPTER II.
THESE, on a general survey, are the modes
Of pulpit oratory which agree
With no unlettered audience.--POLWHELE.
MRS. LESLIE had returned from her visit to the rectory to her own home,
and Evelyn had now been some weeks at Mrs. Merton's. As was natural, she
had grown in some measure reconciled and resigned to her change of abode.
In fact, no sooner did she pass Mrs. Merton's threshold, than, for the
first time, she was made aware of her consequence in life.
The Rev. Mr. Merton was a man of the nicest perception in all things
appertaining to worldly consideration. The second son of a very wealthy
baronet (who was the first commoner of his county) and of the daughter of
a rich and highly-descended peer, Mr. Merton had been brought near enough
to rank and power to appreciate all their advantages. In early life he
had been something of a "tuft-hunter;" but as his understanding was good
and his passions not very strong, he had soon perceived that that vessel
of clay, a young man with a moderate fortune, cannot long sail down the
same stream with the metal vessels of rich earls and extravagant dandies.
Besides, he was destined for the Church--because there was one of the
finest livings in England in the family. He therefore took orders at six
and twenty; married Mrs. Leslie's daughter, who had thirty thousand
pounds: and settled at the rectory of Merton, within a mile of the family
seat. He became a very respectable and extremely popular man. He was
singularly hospitable, and built a new wing--containing a large
dining-room and six capital bed-rooms--to the rectory, which had now much
more the appearance of a country villa than a country parsonage. His
brother, succeeding to the estates, and residing chiefly in the
neighbourhood, became, like his father before him, member for the county,
and was one of the country gentlemen most looked up to in the House of
Commons. A sensible and frequent, though uncommonly prosy speaker,
singularly independent (for he had a clear fourteen thousand pounds a
year, and did not desire office), and valuing himself on not being a
party man, so that his vote on critical questions was often a matter of
great doubt, and, therefore, of great moment, Sir John Merton gave
considerable importance to the Rev. Charles Merton. The latter kept up
all the more select of his old London acquaintances; and few country
houses, at certain seasons of the year, were filled more aristocratically
than the pleasant rectory-house. Mr. Merton, indeed, contrived to make
the Hall a reservoir for the parsonage, and periodically drafted off the
_elite_ of the visitors at the former to spend a few days at the latter.
This was the more easily done, as his brother was a widower, and his
conversation was all of one sort,--the state of the nation and the
agricultural interest. Mr. Merton was upon very friendly terms with his
brother, looked after the property in the absence of Sir John, kept up
the family interest, was an excellent electioneerer, a good speaker at a
pinch, an able magistrate,--a man, in short, most useful in the county;
on the whole, he was more popular than his brother, and almost as much
looked up to--perhaps, because he was much less ostentatious. He had
very good taste, had the Rev. Charles Merton!--his table plentiful, but
plain--his manners affable to the low, though agreeably sycophantic to
the high; and there was nothing about him that ever wounded self-love.
To add to the attractions of his house, his wife, simple and
good-tempered, could talk with anybody, take off the bores, and leave
people to be comfortable in their own way: while he had a large family of
fine children of all ages, that had long given easy and constant excuse
under the name of "little children's parties," for getting up an
impromptu dance or a gypsy dinner,--enlivening the neighbourhood, in
short. Caroline was the eldest; then came a son, attached to a foreign
ministry, and another, who, though only nineteen, was a private secretary
to one of our Indian satraps. The acquaintance of these young gentlemen,
thus engaged, it was therefore Evelyn's misfortune to lose the advantage
of cultivating,--a loss which both Mr. and Mrs. Merton assured her was
very much to be regretted. But to make up to her for such a privation
there were two lovely little girls, one ten, and the other seven years
old, who fell in love with Evelyn at first sight. Caroline was one of
the beauties of the county, clever and conversable, "drew young men," and
set the fashion to young ladies, especially when she returned from
spending the season with Lady Elizabeth.
It was a delightful family!
In person, Mr. Merton was of the middle height; fair, and inclined to
stoutness, with small features, beautiful teeth, and great suavity of
address. Mindful still of the time when he had been "about town," he was
very particular in his dress: his black coat, neatly relieved in the
evening by a white underwaistcoat, and a shirt-front admirably plaited,
with plain studs of dark enamel, his well-cut trousers, and elaborately
polished shoes--he was good-humouredly vain of his feet and hands--won
for him the common praise of the dandies (who occasionally honoured him
with a visit to shoot his game, and flirt with his daughter), "That old
Merton was a most gentlemanlike fellow--so d-----d neat for a parson!"
Such, mentally, morally, and physically, was the Rev. Charles Merton,
rector of Merton, brother of Sir John, and possessor of an income that,
what with his rich living, his wife's fortune, and his own, which was not
inconsiderable, amounted to between four and five thousand pounds a year,
which income, managed with judgment as well as liberality, could not fail
to secure to him all the good things of this world,--the respect of his
friends amongst the rest. Caroline was right when she told Evelyn that
her papa was very different from a mere country parson.
Now this gentleman could not fail to see all the claims that Evelyn might
fairly advance upon the esteem, nay, the veneration of himself and
family: a young beauty, with a fortune of about a quarter of a million,
was a phenomenon that might fairly be called celestial. Her pretensions
were enhanced by her engagement to Lord Vargrave,--an engagement which
might be broken; so that, as he interpreted it, the _worst_ that could
happen to the young lady was to marry an able and rising Minister of
State,--a peer of the realm; but she was perfectly free to marry a still
greater man, if she could find him; and who knows but what perhaps the
_attache_, if he could get leave of absence? Mr. Merton was too sensible
to pursue that thought further for the present.
The good man was greatly shocked at the too familiar manner in which Mrs.
Merton spoke to this high-fated heiress, at Evelyn's travelling so far
without her own maid, at her very primitive wardrobe--poor, ill-used
child! Mr. Merton was a connoisseur in ladies' dress. It was quite
painful to see that the unfortunate girl had been so neglected. Lady
Vargrave must be a very strange person. He inquired compassionately
whether she was allowed any pocket money; and finding, to his relief,
that in that respect Miss Cameron was munificently supplied, he suggested
that a proper abigail should be immediately engaged; that proper orders
to Madame Devy should be immediately transmitted to London, with one of
Evelyn's dresses, as a pattern for nothing but length and breadth. He
almost stamped with vexation when he heard that Evelyn had been placed in
one of the neat little rooms generally appropriated to young lady
visitors.
"She is quite contented, my dear Mr. Merton; she is so simple; she has
not been brought up in the style you think for."
"Mrs. Merton," said the rector, with great solemnity, "Miss Cameron may
know no better now; but what will she think of us hereafter? It is my
maxim to recollect what people will be, and show them that respect which
may leave pleasing impressions when they have it in their power to show
us civility in return."
With many apologies, which quite overwhelmed poor Evelyn, she was
transferred from the little chamber, with its French bed and
bamboo-coloured washhand-stand, to an apartment with a buhl wardrobe and
a four-post bed with green silk curtains, usually appropriated to the
regular Christmas visitant, the Dowager Countess of Chipperton. A pretty
morning room communicated with the sleeping apartment, and thence a
private staircase conducted into the gardens. The whole family were duly
impressed and re-impressed with her importance. No queen could be made
more of. Evelyn mistook it all for pure kindness, and returned the
hospitality with an affection that extended to the whole family, but
particularly to the two little girls, and a beautiful black spaniel. Her
dresses came down from London; her abigail arrived; the buhl wardrobe was
duly filled,--and Evelyn at last learned that it is a fine thing to be
rich. An account of all these proceedings was forwarded to Lady
Vargrave, in a long and most complacent letter, by the rector himself.
The answer was short, but it contented the excellent clergyman; for it
approved of all he had done, and begged that Miss Cameron might have
everything that seemed proper to her station.
By the same post came two letters to Evelyn herself,--one from Lady
Vargrave, one from the curate. They transported her from the fine room
and the buhl wardrobe to the cottage and the lawn; and the fine abigail,
when she came to dress her young lady's hair, found her weeping.
It was a matter of great regret to the rector that it was that time of
year when--precisely because the country is most beautiful--every one
worth knowing is in town. Still, however, some stray guests found their
way to the rectory for a day or two, and still there were some
aristocratic old families in the neighbourhood, who never went up to
London: so that two days in the week the rector's wine flowed, the
whist-tables were set out, and the piano called into requisition.
Evelyn--the object of universal attention and admiration--was put at her
ease by her station itself; for good manners come like an instinct to
those on whom the world smiles. Insensibly she acquired self-possession
and the smoothness of society; and if her child-like playfulness broke
out from all conventional restraint, it only made more charming and
brilliant the great heiress, whose delicate and fairy cast of beauty so
well became her graceful _abandon_ of manner, and who looked so
unequivocally ladylike to the eyes that rested on Madame Devy's blondes
and satins.
Caroline was not so gay as she had been at the cottage. Something seemed
to weigh upon her spirits: she was often moody and thoughtful. She was
the only one in the family not good-tempered; and her peevish replies to
her parents, when no visitor imposed a check on the family circle,
inconceivably pained Evelyn, and greatly contrasted the flow of spirits
which distinguished her when she found somebody worth listening to.
Still Evelyn--who, where she once liked, found it difficult to withdraw
regard--sought to overlook Caroline's blemishes, and to persuade herself
of a thousand good qualities below the surface; and her generous nature
found constant opportunity of venting itself in costly gifts, selected
from the London parcels, with which the officious Mr. Merton relieved the
monotony of the rectory. These gifts Caroline could not refuse without
paining her young friend. She took them reluctantly, for, to do her
justice, Caroline, though ambitious, was not mean.
Thus time passed in the rectory, in gay variety and constant
entertainment; and all things combined to spoil the heiress, if, indeed,
goodness ever is spoiled by kindness and prosperity. Is it to the frost
or to the sunshine that the flower opens its petals, or the fruit ripens
from the blossom?
CHAPTER III.
_Rod_. How sweet these solitary places are!
. . . . . .
_Ped_. What strange musick
Was that we heard afar off?
_Curio_. We've told you what he is, what time we've sought him,
His nature and his name.
BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER. _The Pilgrim_.
ONE day, as the ladies were seated in Mrs. Merton's morning-room, Evelyn,
who had been stationed by the window hearing the little Cecilia go
through the French verbs, and had just finished that agreeable task,
exclaimed,--
"Do tell me to whom that old house belongs, with the picturesque
gable-end and Gothic turrets, there, just peeping through the trees,--I
have always forgot to ask you."
"Oh, my dear Miss Cameron," said Mrs. Merton, "that is Burleigh; have you
not been there? How stupid in Caroline not to show it to you! It is one
of the lions of the place. It belongs to a man you have often heard
of,--Mr. Maltravers."
"Indeed!" cried Evelyn; and she gazed with new interest on the gray
melancholy pile, as the sunshine brought it into strong contrast with the
dark pines around it. "And Mr. Maltravers himself--?"
"Is still abroad, I believe; though I did hear the other day that he was
shortly expected at Burleigh. It is a curious old place, though much
neglected. I believe, indeed, it has not been furnished since the time
of Charles the First. (Cissy, my love, don't stoop so.) Very gloomy, in
my opinion; and not any fine room in the house, except the library, which
was once a chapel. However, people come miles to see it."
"Will you go there to-day?" said Caroline, languidly; "it is a very
pleasant walk through the glebe-land and the wood,--not above half a mile
by the foot-path."
"I should like it so much."
"Yes," said Mrs. Merton, "and you had better go before he returns,--he is
so strange. He does not allow it to be seen when he is down. But,
indeed, he has only been once at the old place since he was of age.
(Sophy, you will tear Miss Cameron's scarf to pieces; do be quiet,
child.) That was before he was a great man; he was then very odd, saw no
society, only dined once with us, though Mr. Merton paid him every
attention. They show the room in which he wrote his books."
"I remember him very well, though I was then but a child," said
Caroline,--"a handsome, thoughtful face."
"Did you think so, my dear? Fine eyes and teeth, certainly, and a
commanding figure, but nothing more."
"Well," said Caroline, "if you like to go, Evelyn, I am at your service."
"And--I--Evy, dear--I--may go," said Cecilia, clinging to Evelyn.
"And me, too," lisped Sophia, the youngest hope,--"there's such a pretty
peacock."
"Oh, yes, they may go, Mrs. Merton, we'll take such care of them."
"Very well, my dear; Miss Cameron quite spoils you."
Evelyn tripped away to put on her bonnet, and the children ran after her,
clapping their hands,--they could not bear to lose sight of her for a
moment.
"Caroline," said Mrs. Merton, affectionately, "are you not well? You
have seemed pale lately, and not in your usual spirits."
"Oh, yes, I'm well enough," answered Caroline, rather peevishly; "but
this place is so dull now; very provoking that Lady Elizabeth does not go
to London this year."
"My dear, it will be gayer, I hope, in July, when the races at Knaresdean
begin; and Lord Vargrave has promised to come."
"Has Lord Vargrave written to you lately?"
"No, my dear."
"Very odd."
"Does Evelyn ever talk of him?"
"Not much," said Caroline, rising and quitting the room.
It was a most cheerful exhilarating day,--the close of sweet May; the
hedges were white with blossoms; a light breeze rustled the young leaves;
the butterflies had ventured forth, and the children chased them over the
grass, as Evelyn and Caroline, who walked much too slow for her companion
(Evelyn longed to run), followed them soberly towards Burleigh.
They passed the glebe-fields; and a little bridge, thrown over a brawling
rivulet, conducted them into a wood.
"This stream," said Caroline, "forms the boundary between my uncle's
estates and those of Mr. Maltravers. It must be very unpleasant to so
proud a man as Mr. Maltravers is said to be, to have the land of another
proprietor so near his house. He could hear my uncle's gun from his very
drawing-room. However, Sir John takes care not to molest him. On the
other side, the Burleigh estates extend for some miles; indeed, Mr.
Maltravers is the next great proprietor to my uncle in this part of the
county. Very strange that he does not marry! There, now you can see the
house."
The mansion lay somewhat low, with hanging woods in the rear: and the
old-fashioned fish-ponds gleaming in the sunshine and overshadowed by
gigantic trees increased the venerable stillness of its aspect. Ivy and
innumerable creepers covered one side of the house; and long weeds
cumbered the deserted road.
"It is sadly neglected," said Caroline; "and was so, even in the last
owner's life. Mr. Maltravers inherits the place from his mother's uncle.
We may as well enter the house by the private way. The front entrance is
kept locked up."
Winding by a path that conducted into a flower-garden, divided from the
park by a ha-ha, over which a plank and a small gate, rusting off its
hinges, were placed, Caroline led the way towards the building. At this
point of view it presented a large bay window that by a flight of four
steps led into the garden. On one side rose a square, narrow turret,
surmounted by a gilt dome and quaint weathercock, below the architrave of
which was a sun-dial, set in the stonework; and another dial stood in the
garden, with the common and beautiful motto,--
"Non numero horas, nisi serenas!"*
* "I number not the hours, unless sunny."
On the other side of the bay window a huge buttress cast its mass of
shadow. There was something in the appearance of the whole place that
invited to contemplation and repose,--something almost monastic. The
gayety of the teeming spring-time could not divest the spot of a certain
sadness, not displeasing, however, whether to the young, to whom there is
a luxury in the vague sentiment of melancholy, or to those who, having
known real griefs, seek for an anodyne in meditation and memory. The low
lead-coloured door, set deep in the turret, was locked, and the bell
beside it broken. Caroline turned impatiently away. "We must go round
to the other side," said she, "and try to make the deaf old man hear us."
"Oh, Carry!" cried Cecilia, "the great window is open;" and she ran up
the steps.
"That is lucky," said Caroline; and the rest followed Cecilia.
Evelyn now stood within the library of which Mrs. Merton had spoken. It
was a large room, about fifty feet in length, and proportionably wide;
somewhat dark, for the light came only from the one large window through
which they entered; and though the window rose to the cornice of the
ceiling, and took up one side of the apartment, the daylight was subdued
by the heaviness of the stonework in which the narrow panes were set, and
by the glass stained with armorial bearings in the upper part of the
casement. The bookcases, too, were of the dark oak which so much absorbs
the light; and the gilding, formerly meant to relieve them, was
discoloured by time.
The room was almost disproportionably lofty; the ceiling, elaborately
coved, and richly carved with grotesque masks, preserved the Gothic
character of the age in which it had been devoted to a religious purpose.
Two fireplaces, with high chimney-pieces of oak, in which were inserted
two portraits, broke the symmetry of the tall bookcases. In one of these
fireplaces were half-burnt logs; and a huge armchair, with a small
reading-desk beside it, seemed to bespeak the recent occupation of the
room. On the fourth side, opposite the window, the wall was covered with
faded tapestry, representing the meeting of Solomon and the Queen of
Sheba; the arras was nailed over doors on either hand,--the chinks
between the door and the wall serving, in one instance, to cut off in the
middle his wise majesty, who was making a low bow; while in the other it
took the ground from under the wanton queen, just as she was descending
from her chariot.
Near the window stood a grand piano, the only modern article in the room,
save one of the portraits, presently to be described. On all this Evelyn
gazed silently and devoutly: she had naturally that reverence for genius
which is common to the enthusiastic and young; and there is, even to the
dullest, a certain interest in the homes of those who have implanted
within us a new thought. But here there was, she imagined, a rare and
singular harmony between the place and the mental characteristics of the
owner. She fancied she now better understood the shadowy and
metaphysical repose of thought that had distinguished the earlier
writings of Maltravers,--the writings composed or planned in this still
retreat.
But what particularly caught her attention was one of the two portraits
that adorned the mantelpieces. The further one was attired in the rich
and fanciful armour of the time of Elizabeth; the head bare, the helmet
on a table on which the hand rested. It was a handsome and striking
countenance; and an inscription announced it to be a Digby, an ancestor
of Maltravers.