Book: My Novel, Volume 8.

E >> Edward Bulwer Lytton >> My Novel, Volume 8.




"Character--ah, that is indispensable?"

"I should think so, indeed. A Mrs. Hazeldean of Hazeldean--You frighten
me. He's not going to run off with a divorced woman, or a--"

The squire stopped, and looked so red in the face that Randal feared he
might be seized with apoplexy before Frank's crimes had made him alter
his will.

Therefore he hastened to relieve Mr. Hazeldean's mind, and assured him
that he had been only talking at random; that Frank was in the habit,
indeed, of seeing foreign ladies occasionally, as all persons in the
London world were; but that he was sure Frank would never marry without
the full consent and approval of his parents. He ended by repeating his
assurance, that he would warn the squire if ever it became necessary.
Still, however, he left Mr. Hazeldean so disturbed and uneasy that that
gentleman forgot all about the farm, and went moodily on in the opposite
direction, reentering the park at its farther extremity. As soon as they
approached the house, the squire hastened to shut himself with his wife
in full parental consultation; and Randal, seated upon a bench on the
terrace, revolved the mischief he had done, and its chances of success.

While thus seated, and thus thinking, a footstep approached cautiously,
and a low voice said, in broken English, "Sare, sare, let me speak vid
you."

Randal turned in surprise, and beheld a swarthy, saturnine face, with
grizzled hair and marked features. He recognized the figure that had
joined Riccabocca in the Italian's garden. "Speak-a-you Italian?"
resumed Jackeymo.

Randal, who had made himself an excellent linguist, nodded assent; and
Jackeymo, rejoiced, begged him to withdraw into a more private part of
the grounds.

Randal obeyed, and the two gained the shade of a stately chestnut avenue.

"Sir," then said Jackeymo, speaking in his native tongue, and expressing
himself with a certain simple pathos, "I am but a poor man; my name is
Giacomo. You have heard of me; servant to the signore whom you saw
to-day,--only a servant; but he honours me with his confidence. We have
known danger together; and of all his friends and followers, I alone came
with him to the stranger's land."

"Good, faithful fellow," said Randal, examining the man's face, "say on.
Your master confides in you? He has confided that which I told him this
day?"

"He did. Ah, sir; the padrone was too proud to ask you to explain more,
--too proud to show fear of another. But he does fear, he ought to fear,
he shall fear," continued Jackeymo, working himself up to passion,--"for
the padrone has a daughter, and his enemy is a villain. Oh, sir, tell me
all that you did not tell to the padrone. You hinted that this man might
wish to marry the signora. Marry her!---I could cut his throat at the
altar!"

"Indeed," said Randal, "I believe that such is his object."

"But why? He is rich, she is penniless,--no, not quite that, for we
have saved--but penniless, compared to him."

"My good friend, I know not yet his motives; but I can easily learn them.
If, however, this count be your master's enemy, it is surely well to
guard against him, whatever his designs; and to do so, you should move
into London or its neighbourhood. I fear that, while we speak, the count
may get upon his track."

"He had better not come here!" cried the servant, menacingly, and putting
his hand where the knife was not.

"Beware of your own anger, Giacomo. One act of violence, and you would
be transported from England, and your mast'r would lose a friend."

Jackeymo seemed struck by this caution.

"And if the padrone were to meet him, do you think the padrone would
meekly say, 'Come sta sa Signoria'? The padrone would strike him dead!"

"Hush! hush! You speak of what in England is called murder, and is
punished by the gallows. If you really love your master, for Heaven's
sake get him from this place, get him from all chance of such passion and
peril. I go to town to-morrow; I will find him a house, that shall be
safe from all spies, all discovery. And there, too, my friend. I can do
what I cannot at this distance,--watch over him, and keep watch also on
his enemy."

Jackeymo seized Randal's hand, and lifted it towards his lip; then,
as if struck by a sudden suspicion, dropped the hand, and said bluntly,
"Signore, I think you have seen the padrone twice. Why do you take this
interest in him?"

"Is it so uncommon to take interest even in a stranger who is menaced by
some peril?"

Jackeymo, who believed little in general philanthropy, shook his head
sceptically.

"Besides," continued Randal, suddenly bethinking himself of a more
plausible reason,--"besides, I am a friend and connection of Mr. Egerton;
and Mr. Egerton's most intimate friend is Lord L'Estrange; and I have
heard that Lord L'Estrange--"

"The good lord! Oh, now I understand," interrupted Jackeymo, and his
brow cleared. "Ah, if he were in England! But you will let us know when
he comes?"

"Certainly. Now, tell me, Giacomo, is this count really unprincipled and
dangerous? Remember I know him not personally."

"He has neither heart nor conscience."

"That defect makes him dangerous to men; perhaps not less so to women.
Could it be possible, if he obtained any interview with the signora, that
he could win her affections?" Jackeymo crossed himself rapidly and made
no answer.

"I have heard that he is still very handsome." Jackeymo groaned.

Randal resumed, "Enough; persuade the padrone to come to town."

"But if the count is in town?"

"That makes no difference; the safest place is always the largest city.
Everywhere else, a foreigner is in himself an object of attention and
curiosity."

"True."

"Let your master, then, come to London, or rather, into its
neighbourhood. He can reside in one of the suburbs most remote from the
count's haunts. In two days I will have found him a lodging and write to
him. You trust to me now?"

"I do indeed,--I do, Excellency. Ah, if the signorina were married, we
would not care!"

"Married! But she looks so high!"

"Alas! not now! not here!"

Randal sighed heavily. Jackeymo's eyes sparkled. He thought he had
detected a new motive for Randal's interest,--a motive to an Italian the
most natural, the most laudable of all.

"Find the house, Signore, write to the padrone. He shall come. I'll
talk to him. I can manage him. Holy San Giacomo, bestir thyself now,--
't is long since I troubled thee!"

Jackeymo strode off through the fading trees, smiling and muttering as he
went.

The first dinner-bell rang, and on entering the drawingroom, Randal found
Parson Dale and his wife, who had been invited in haste to meet the
unexpected visitor.

The preliminary greetings over, Mr. Dale took the opportunity afforded by
the squire's absence to inquire after the health of Mr. Egerton.

"He is always well," said Randal. "I believe he is made of iron."

"His heart is of gold," said the parson.

"Ah," said Randal, inquisitively, "you told me you had come in contact
with him once, respecting, I think, some of your old parishioners at
Lansmere?"

The parson nodded, and there was a moment's silence.

"Do you remember your battle by the stocks, Mr. Leslie?" said Mr. Dale,
with a good-humoured laugh.

"Indeed, yes. By the way, now you speak of it, I met my old opponent in
London the first year I went up to it."

"You did! where?"

"At a literary scamp's,--a cleverish man called Burley."

"Burley! I have seen some burlesque verses in Greek by a Mr. Burley."

"No doubt the same person. He has disappeared,--gone to the dogs, I dare
say. Burlesque Greek is not a knowledge very much in power at present."

"Well, but Leonard Fairfield--you have seen him since?"

"No."

"Nor heard of him?"

"No; have you?"

"Strange to say, not for a long time. But I have reason to believe that
he must be doing well."

"You surprise me! Why?"

"Because two years ago he sent for his mother. She went to him."

"Is that all?"

"It is enough; for he would not have sent for her if he could not
maintain her."

Here the Hazeldeans entered, arm-in-arm, and the fat butler announced
dinner.

The squire was unusually taciturn, Mrs. Hazeldean thoughtful, Mrs. Dale
languid and headachy. The parson, who seldom enjoyed the luxury of
converse with a scholar, save when he quarrelled with Dr. Riccaboeca, was
animated by Randal's repute for ability into a great desire for argument.

"A glass of wine, Mr. Leslie. You were saying, before dinner, that
burlesque Greek is not a knowledge very much in power at present. Pray,
Sir, what knowledge is in power?"

RANDAL (laconically).--"Practical knowledge."

PARSON.--"What of?"

RANDAL.--"Men."

PARSON (candidly).--"Well, I suppose that is the most available sort of
knowledge, in a worldly point of view. How does one learn it? Do books
help?"

RANDAL.--"According as they are read, they help or injure."

PARSON.--"How should they be read in order to help?"

RANDAL.--"Read specially to apply to purposes that lead to power."

PARSON (very much struck with Randal's pithy and Spartan logic).--" Upon
my word, Sir, you express yourself very well. I must own that I began
these questions in the hope of differing from you; for I like an
argument."

"That he does," growled the squire; "the most contradictory creature!"

PARSON.---"Argument is the salt of talk. But now I am afraid I must
agree with you, which I was not at all prepared for."

Randal bowed and answered, "No two men of our education can dispute upon
the application of knowledge."

PARSON (pricking up his ears).--"Eh?--what to?"

RANDAL.--"Power, of course."

PARSON (overjoyed).--"Power!--the vulgarest application of it, or the
loftiest? But you mean the loftiest?"

RANDAL (in his turn interested and interrogative).--" What do you call
the loftiest, and what the vulgarest?"

PARSON.--"The vulgarest, self-interest; the loftiest, beneficence."

Randal suppressed the half-disdainful smile that rose to his lip.

"You speak, Sir, as a clergyman should do. I admire your sentiment, and
adopt it; but I fear that the knowledge which aims only at beneficence
very rarely in this world gets any power at all."

SQUIRE (seriously).--"That's true; I never get my own way when I want to
do a kindness, and Stirn always gets his when he insists on something
diabolically brutal and harsh."

PARSON.--"Pray, Mr. Leslie, what does intellectual power refined to the
utmost, but entirely stripped of beneficence, most resemble?"

RANDAL.--"Resemble?--I can hardly say. Some very great man--almost any
very great man--who has baffled all his foes, and attained all his ends."

PARSON.--"I doubt if any man has ever become very great who has not meant
to be beneficent, though he might err in the means. Caesar was naturally
beneficent, and so was Alexander. But intellectual power refined to the
utmost, and wholly void of beneficence, resembles only one being, and
that, sir, is the Principle of Evil."

RANDAL (startled).--"Do you mean the Devil?"

PARSON.--"Yes, Sir, the Devil; and even he, Sir, did not succeed! Even
he, Sir, is what your great men would call a most decided failure."

MRS. DALE.--"My dear, my dear!"

PARSON.--"Our religion proves it, my love; he was an angel, and he fell."

There was a solemn pause. Randal was more impressed than he liked to own
to himself. By this time the dinner was over, and the servants had
retired. Harry glanced at Carry. Carry smoothed her gown and rose.

The gentlemen remained over their wine; and the parson, satisfied with
what he deemed a clencher upon his favourite subject of discussion,
changed the subject to lighter topics, till, happening to fall upon
tithes, the squire struck in, and by dint of loudness of voice, and
truculence of brow, fairly overwhelmed both his guests, and proved to
his own satisfaction that tithes were an unjust and unchristianlike
usurpation on the part of the Church generally, and a most especial and
iniquitous infliction upon the Hazeldean estates in particular.




CHAPTER IX.

On entering the drawing-room, Randal found the two ladies seated close
together, in a position much more appropriate to the familiarity of their
school-days than to the politeness of the friendship now existing between
them. Mrs. Hazeldean's hand hung affectionately over Carry's shoulder,
and both those fair English faces were bent over the same book. It was
pretty to see these sober matrons, so different from each other in
character and aspect, thus unconsciously restored to the intimacy of
happy maiden youth by the golden link of some Magician from the still
land of Truth or Fancy, brought together in heart, as each eye rested on
the same thought; closer and closer, as sympathy, lost in the actual
world, grew out of that world which unites in one bond of feeling the
readers of some gentle book.

"And what work interests you so much?" asked Randal, pausing by the
table.

"One you have read, of course," replied Mrs. Dale, putting a book-mark
embroidered by herself into the page, and handing the volume to Randal.
"It has made a great sensation, I believe."

Randal glanced at the title of the work. "True," said he, "I have heard
much of it in London, but I have not yet had time to read it."

MRS. DALE.--"I can lend it to you, if you like to look over it to-night,
and you can leave it for me with Mrs. Hazeldean."

PARSON (approaching).--"Oh, that book!--yes, you must read it. I do not
know a work more instructive."

RANDAL.--"Instructive! Certainly I will read it then. But I thought it
was a mere work of amusement,--of fancy. It seems so as I look over it."

PARSON.--"So is the 'Vicar of Wakefield;' yet what book more
instructive?"

RANDAL.--"I should not have said that of the 'Vicar of Wakefield.' A
pretty book enough, though the story is most improbable. But how is it
instructive?"

PARSON.--"By its results: it leaves us happier and better. What can any
instruction do more? Some works instruct through the head, some through
the heart. The last reach the widest circle, and often produce the most
genial influence on the character. This book belongs to the last. You
will grant my proposition when you have read it."

Randal smiled and took the volume.

MRS. DALE.--" Is the author known yet?"

RANDAL.--"I have heard it ascribed to many writers, but I believe no one
has claimed it."

PARSON.--"I think it must have been written by my old college friend,
Professor Moss, the naturalist,--its descriptions of scenery are so
accurate."

MRS. DALE.--"La, Charles dear! that snuffy, tiresome, prosy professor?
How can you talk such nonsense? I am sure the author must be young,
there is so much freshness of feeling."

MRS. HAZELDEAN (positively).--"Yes, certainly, young."

PARSON (no less positively).--"I should say just the contrary. Its tone
is too serene, and its style too simple, for a young man. Besides, I
don't know any young man who would send me his book, and this book has
been sent me, very handsomely bound, too, you see. Depend upon it Moss
is the loan--quite his turn of mind."

MRS. DALE.--"You are too provoking, Charles dear! Mr. Moss is so
remarkably plain, too."

RANDAL.--"Must an author be handsome?"

PARSON.--"Ha! ha! Answer that if you can, Carry." Carry remained mute
and disdainful.

SQUIRE (with great naivete).--" Well, I don't think there's much in the
book, whoever wrote it; for I've read it myself, and understand every
word of it."

MRS. DALE.--"I don't see why you should suppose it was written by a man
at all. For my part, I think it must be a woman."

MRS. HAZELDEAN.--"Yes, there's a passage about maternal affection, which
only a woman could have written."

PARSON.--"Pooh! pooh! I should like to see a woman who could have
written that description of an August evening before a thunderstorm;
every wild-flower in the hedgerow exactly the flowers of August, every
sign in the air exactly those of the month. Bless you! a woman would
have filled the hedge with violets and cowslips. Nobody else but my
friend Moss could have written that description."

SQUIRE.--"I don't know; there's a simile about the waste of corn-seed in
hand-sowing, which makes me think he must be a farmer!"

MRS. DALE (scornfully).--"A farmer! In hobnailed shoes, I suppose!
I say it is a woman."

MRS. HAZELDEAN.--"A WOMAN, and A MOTHER!"

PARSON.--"A middle-aged man, and a naturalist."

SQUIRE.--"No, no, Parson, certainly a young man; for that love-scene puts
me in mind of my own young days, when I would have given my ears to tell
Harry how handsome I thought her; and all I could say was, 'Fine weather
for the crops, Miss.' Yes, a young man and a farmer. I should not
wonder if he had held the plough himself."

RANDAL (who had been turning over the pages).--"This sketch of Night in
London comes from a man who has lived the life of cities and looked at
wealth with the eyes of poverty. Not bad! I will read the book."

"Strange," said the parson, smiling, "that this little work should so
have entered into our minds, suggested to all of us different ideas, yet
equally charmed all,--given a new and fresh current to our dull country
life, animated us as with the sight of a world in our breasts we had
never seen before save in dreams: a little work like this by a man we
don't know and never may! Well, that knowledge is power, and a noble
one!"

"A sort of power, certainly, sir," said Randal, candidly; and that night,
when Randal retired to his own room, he suspended his schemes and
projects, and read, as he rarely did, without an object to gain by the
reading.

The work surprised him by the pleasure it gave. Its charm lay in the
writer's calm enjoyment of the beautiful. It seemed like some happy soul
sunning itself in the light of its own thoughts. Its power was so
tranquil and even, that it was only a critic who could perceive how much
force and vigour were necessary to sustain the wing that floated aloft
with so imperceptible an effort. There was no one faculty predominating
tyrannically over the others; all seemed proportioned in the felicitous
symmetry of a nature rounded, integral, and complete. And when the work
was closed, it left behind it a tender warmth that played round the heart
of the reader and vivified feelings which seemed unknown before. Randal
laid down the book softly; and for five minutes the ignoble and base
purposes to which his own knowledge was applied stood before him, naked
and unmasked.

"Tut!" said he, wrenching himself violently away from the benign
influence, "it was not to sympathize with Hector, but to conquer with
Achilles, that Alexander of Macedon kept Homer under his pillow. Such
should be the true use of books to him who has the practical world to
subdue; let parsons and women construe it otherwise, as they may!"

And the Principle of Evil descended again upon the intellect from which
the guide of Beneficence was gone.




CHAPTER X.

Randal rose at the sound of the first breakfast-bell, and on the
staircase met Mrs. Haaeldean. He gave her back the book; and as he was
about to speak, she beckoned to him to follow her into a little morning-
room appropriated to herself,--no boudoir of white and gold, with
pictures by Watteau, but lined with large walnut-tree presses, that held
the old heirloom linen, strewed with lavender, stores for the
housekeeper, and medicines for the poor.

Seating herself on a large chair in this sanctum, Mrs. Hazeldean looked
formidably at home.

"Pray," said the lady, coming at once to the point, with her usual
straightforward candour, "what is all this you have been saying to my
husband as to the possibility of Frank's marrying a foreigner?"

RANDAL.--"Would you be as averse to such a notion as Mr. Hazeldean is?"

MRS. HAZELDEAN.--"You ask me a question, instead of answering mine."

Randal was greatly put out in his fence by these rude thrusts. For
indeed he had a double purpose to serve,--first, thoroughly to know if
Frank's marriage with a woman like Madame di Negra would irritate the
squire sufficiently to endanger the son's inheritance; and, secondly, to
prevent Mr. and Mrs. Hazeldean believing seriously that such a marriage
was to be apprehended, lest they should prematurely address Frank on the
subject, and frustrate the marriage itself. Yet, withal, he must so
express himself, that he could not be afterwards accused by the parents
of disguising matters. In his talk to the squire the preceding day, he
had gone a little too far,--further than he would have done but for his
desire of escaping the cattle-shed and short-horns. While he mused, Mrs.
Hazeldean observed him with her honest sensible eyes, and finally
exclaimed,

"Out with it, Mr. Leslie!"

"Out with what, my dear madam? The squire has sadly exaggerated the
importance of what was said mainly in jest. But I will own to you
plainly, that Frank has appeared to me a little smitten with a certain
fair Italian."

"Italian!" cried Mrs. Hazeldean. "Well, I said so from the first.
Italian!---that's all, is it?" and she smiled. Randal was more and more
perplexed. The pupil of his eye contracted, as it does when we retreat
into ourselves, and think, watch, and keep guard.

"And perhaps," resumed Mrs. Hazeldean, with a very sunny expression of
countenance, "you have noticed this in Frank since he was here?"

"It is true," murmured Randal; "but I think his heart or his fancy was
touched even before."

"Very natural," said Mrs. Hazeldean; "how could he help it?---such a
beautiful creature! Well, I must not ask you to tell Frank's secrets;
but I guess the object of attraction; and though she will have no fortune
to speak of, and it is not such a match as he might form, still she is so
amiable, and has been so well brought up, and is so little like one's
general notions of a Roman Catholic, that I think I could persuade
Hazeldean into giving his consent."

"Ah," said Randal, drawing a long breath, and beginning, with his
practised acuteness, to detect Mrs. Ilazeldean's error, "I am very much
relieved and rejoiced to hear this; and I may venture to give Frank some
hope, if I find him disheartened and desponding, poor fellow?"

"I think you may," replied Mrs. Hazeldean, laughing pleasantly. "But you
should not have frightened poor William so, hinting that the lady knew
very little English. She has an accent, to be sure; but she speaks our
tongue very prettily. I always forget that she 's not English born! Ha,
ha, poor William!"

RANDAL.--"Ha, ha!"

MRS. HAZELDEAN.--"We had once thought of another match for Frank,--a girl
of good English family."

RANDAL.--"Miss Sticktorights?"

MRS. HAZELDEAN.---"No; that's an old whim of Hazeldean's. But I doubt if
the Sticktorights would ever merge their property in ours. Bless you!
it would be all off the moment they came to settlements, and had to give
up the right of way. We thought of a very different match; but there's
no dictating to young hearts, Mr. Leslie."

RANDAL.--"Indeed no, Mrs. Hazeldean. But since we now understand each
other so well, excuse me if I suggest that you had better leave things to
themselves, and not write to Frank on the subject. Young hearts, you
know, are often stimulated by apparent difficulties, and grow cool when
the obstacle vanishes."

MRS. HAZELDEAN.--"Very possibly; it was not so with Hazeldean and me.
But I shall not write to Frank on the subject for a different reason--
though I would consent to the match, and so would William; yet we both
would rather, after all, that Frank married an Englishwoman, and a
Protestant. We will not, therefore, do anything to encourage the idea.
But if Frank's happiness becomes really at stake, then we will step in.
In short, we would neither encourage nor oppose. You understand?"

"Perfectly."

"And in the mean while, it is quite right that Frank should see the
world, and try to distract his mind, or at least to know it. And I dare
say it has been some thought of that kind which has prevented his coming
here."

Randal, dreading a further and plainer eclaircissement, now rose, and
saying, "Pardon me, but I must hurry over breakfast, and be back in time
to catch the coach"--offered his arm to his hostess, and led her into the
breakfast-parlour. Devouring his meal, as if in great haste, he then
mounted his horse, and, taking cordial leave of his entertainers, trotted
briskly away.

All things favoured his project,--even chance had befriended him in Mrs.
Hazeldean's mistake. She had, not unnaturally, supposed Violante to have
captivated Frank on his last visit to the Hall. Thus, while Randal had
certified his own mind that nothing could more exasperate the squire than
an alliance with Madame di Negra, he could yet assure Frank that Mrs.
Hazeldean was all on his side. And when the error was discovered, Mrs.
Hazeldean would only have to blame herself for it. Still more successful
had his diplomacy proved with the Riccaboccas: he had ascertained the
secret he had come to discover; he should induce the Italian to remove to
the neighbourhood of London; and if Violante were the great heiress he
suspected her to prove, whom else of her own age would she see but him?
And the old Leslie domains to be sold in two years--a portion of the
dowry might purchase them! Flushed by the triumph of his craft, all
former vacillations of conscience ceased. In high and fervent spirits he
passed the Casino, the garden of which was solitary and deserted, reached
his home, and, telling Oliver to be studious, and Juliet to be patient,
walked thence to meet the coach and regain the capital.

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