Helen's Ordeal

Front matter

HELEN'S ORDEAL BY THE SAME AUTHOR. LENA'S PICTURE. Crown 8vo. 5s. SOME PRESS OPINIONS. "Lena's Picture" is a very remarkable book, classify it as we may. . . . In vividness of portraiture, Mrs. Russell Barrington has not all the cunning of some other novelists, such as Mr. Thomas Hardy or George Eliot. She works on a smaller canvas than these, and has less breadth and ease of presentation : during the first part of the work narration takes the place of action, and the characters are described to us before they are set in motion. Thus we hear about them as we hear stories of somebody else's friends ; that is to say, with some coolness. But after reading the book we return to these introductory chapters with the pleasure with which we hear news of friends who have become our own. — The Speaker.

Mrs. Russell Barrington has written a story of a very original kind, of which the effective execution must have been even more difficult than the original conception. ... It is impossible to call the story one of pure melancholy. On the contrary, it is full of that bright transfiguration which sadness undergoes when there is even more in it of serenity than of sadness, and more of strength than either. We had no conception, when we had mastered the main lines of the story, that it could grow in interest with every page of the second volume, and leave so simple and natural and yet so vivid an impression of the influx of power from "beyond the veil." — The Spectator. Mrs. Barrington's treatment gives the book a distinct and almost important place among the so-called "serious" novels of the day.

The story is told from the realistic point of view, but whereas most realism sounds the note of hopelessness, often of despair, Mrs. Barrington's, for all its sadness, is full of hope and faith. And in this she sounds a truer note than do most of the other realists. — Pall Mall Gazette. A novel where all things are beautiful, and where the reader can find literary authority for things involving questions of taste, may very likely gratify many readers. Mrs. Barrington's " Lena's Picture " is a story which illustrates the true faith of the artistic person. It so happens that it is a beautiful, if sad, story, and that it is remarkably well written; and in this respect it is quite in keeping with its aim and object. Everything about it is well-proportioned. — lhe St. James's Gazette. HELEN'S ORDEAL BV Mrs. RUSSELL BARRINGTON author of 'lena's picture' ' She was a just because she was a generous woman ' London OSGOOD, MCILVAINE & CO. 45 ALBEMARLE STREET, W. 1894 A ll rights reserved TO <&. te JH THE BEST OF FRIENDS IN FAIR AND STORMY WEATHER IN MEMORY OF THE SPRING, THE SUNSETS, AND ALL THE THINGS BRIGHT AND BEAUTIFUL ENJOYED ON THE LUNGO IL MUGNONE, FLORENCE,

Part I Chapter

I This is a spray the bird clung to, Making it blossom with pleasure, Ere the high tree-top she sprung to, Fit for her nest and her treasure. Oh, what a hope beyond measure Was the poor spray's which the flying feet clung to, — So to be singled out, built in, and sung to ! This is a heart the Queen leant on, Thrilled in a minute erratic, Ere the true bosom she bent on, Meet for love's regal dalmatic : — Oh, what a fancy ecstatic Was the poor heart's, ere the wanderer went on — Love to be saved for it, proffered to, spent on ! Browning. 'Perhaps some day, Roland.' This was said in answer to an urgent appeal made by- Roland Travant to Helen, an appeal having for its purport nothing less than that Helen should do her best to love him and become his wife. In the middle on either side of the passage which crosses the river Arno at Florence by the Ponte Vecchio, — the passage which connects the gallery in the Uffizi with the Pitti Palace, — are two windows overlooking the river which flows on the one side down from the east, — from the hills overtopped by the Vallombrosa heights, and on the other, B away towards the west and the distant Carrara peaks.

There is a green velvet seat placed under the window looking east wards, and on this Helen was resting. She said those words, ' Perhaps some day, Roland,' softly, rather carelessly, — as if she could not be expected definitely to make up her mind on such a subject ; but also with a friendly, comfortable air, as if Roland could have no right whatever to be dissatisfied with their indefiniteness. She turned and looked away, — out to the dreamy sunlit lands of vine and olive, beyond the flowing Arno spanned over by the Ponte Alle Grazie, the shadow of each pier marked by a space of clear liquid green, lying, it would seem, on the tremulous surface of the water. Away over the river looked Helen, above its winding course up to the mountains rising pink and golden in the morning light, and shadowed by gauzy veils of lazuli blue floating sleepily in the folds and valleys of the hills.

The air was twinkling with sunlight softened by vaporous morning mists drawn up from the earth and river by the heat of approaching mid-day. Something of the romance of Roland's love had come off like a bloom upon Helen as she had listened to him telling her of his love of years' standing ; which had begun when she was a little girl and he was a boy. Listening to this romance seemed to have softened and ripened her beauty. The deep white lids fell half over the soft blue eyes, dimming their youthful childlike brightness, but leaving a latent light suggesting hints of things as yet vague and not fully realised ; — things nevertheless felt by Helen as belong ing to a world of beauty and romance. The sweet young lips parted and softened into subtler and more sensitive curves as this contagion of love was felt in the air so close to her.

But it was the bloom without the substance of the fruit; for Helen did not love Roland; nor did she then know what it was to care for any one more than for her dear friend Roland : but the charm of that ' very vagabond ' had affected her second-hand, — had made the view across the Arno to the mountains all flooded with Italian light and colour more poetical, — the flowing of the river more soothing, — the sunshine in the air and on the Vallombrosa heights more intoxicating ; because Roland, her friend, had become unreasonably ardent and had passed into that ' very vagabond's ' domains, and had asked her to become unreasonable with him, and join him in this land of unknown and strange fervour. She was hardly conscious of hearing a footstep till it approached quite near the centre of the gallery where she was sitting and where Roland was standing over her lolling against the side of the window.

But the figure which approached had seen Helen, — had seen, and had been struck by her grace and the beautiful colour of her face, her hair, and her raisin-coloured garments. The personality of some people seems to echo particular tones of colour ; certain tints become associated with their appearance, and they look more like themselves when they are dressed in them. Helen's own particular hue was raisin. It seemed to suit better than any other the rich white fairness of her skin and the faint shell-like pink that started to her cheek whenever she was excited, the pink which also so delicately tinted her lips. It seemed to be also exactly the right contrast to her hair, — a mass of bronze-brown waves haloed with rebellious little threads of gold which never would keep tidily within their lawful limits, but were for ever straying beyond in a crinkled fringe of rippling light.

Besides, it being in harmony with her colouring, this raisin hue seemed also to echo something of her nature. There are perfect natures — the saintlike women whose colour is blue, — and there are strong fiery natures whose colour is red. Helen was no perfect woman ; she was wilful, — she was imperative in her wilfulness. Still she possessed more than her share of ideality ; and so some hint of blue in her colour was allowable, — warmed with a good deal of red, — raisin in fact. That day as she sat on the seat in the gallery looking over the river, her hat and cloak and dress were all of a soft raisin colour, and as her face was turned almost profile, and her eyes looked up to the Vallombrosa heights with a dreamy beauty veiling them, which, love in the air, and sunshine and art, and all that beautiful Florence can steep us with in the early days of May, — Helen would have struck the eye and the imagination of any one with eyes to see and an understanding wherewith to enjoy such beauty.

And the eye of this artist, Robert Faine, who was walking quietly across from one gallery to another, could see better than most eyes can see, and his brain could realise better than most brains can realise, what a beautiful thing it was his eye rested on when it rested on Helen. It was especially her throat which, as he drew near, he looked at intently as admirable and worthy of note. Her throat was generally a prominent feature in Helen's appearance. In every attitude somehow it became noticeable. It might have been the throat of a Greek statue. The face and the ear were set small upon it, and it was so rounded and filled in, that, however thin she might have become, never could there have been that scooping out behind the ear so common among English and American men and women, which at once suggests the word scraggy.

At the moment Robert Faine noticed Helen's throat the light and shade played becomingly on the rich fair colour and tone ; and, ever intent upon enlarging his store of impressions, he looked at it very earnestly in order to learn from it all he could. As Helen heard his footstep close to her and turned, she met his gaze riveted very intently on her. Robert Faine was middle-aged, rather tall and spare. Had he not been a remarkable man in every sense he might with truth have been described as very handsome : but he was so much besides, that handsome did not seem the right word to use. His face was clean shaven ; his habitual expression of countenance serious and reserved ; his gray eyes seemed to take in a great deal from the outside world but to reveal strangely little of the inner man. Their glance had a controlling, almost a mesmeric power, when the owner chose to use it : but it was never sympathetic.

It revealed no weakness, nor did it ever show any tolerance or pity for weakness in others. Helen met this glance and felt interested, but awed. Those eyes seemed to belong to one who was apart and above the commonplace race of men. But why did they look at her with such a grave, still intensity, — so much differing from the ordinary admiration which her beauty excited ? And indeed real beauty excited in Robert Faine a very different emotion from that felt by the ordinary race of men. Perhaps it was nearer to a religious emotion than any other he ever experienced. As he walked past Roland and Helen, Roland touched his hat with his cane and let out a careless ' How d'ye do ? ' Robert Faine did not speak but made a more formal response to Roland's greeting. ' Who's that ? ' Helen said eagerly when Robert Faine had passed out of hearing. ' Robert Faine.

Haven't you seen him before ? ' ' Not the great Faine, the painter ? ' exclaimed Helen with wide-open eyes and amazement looking up into Roland's face. 'Yes.' ' But why didn't you tell me before, Roland ? ' How could I ? ' ' Oh yes, you could ; I should have looked at him much more if I had known.' ' I do not think you could have looked much more than you did, Helen,' Roland answered, half amused and half inclined to be jealous. ' Now mind, Roland — swear ; — if you ever get the chance you will introduce him to me.' ' I do not know that I shall' ' Swear, Roland,' persisted Helen. ' All right,' said easy-going Roland of few words. ' It's most exciting to see the great Faine in the flesh,' continued Helen, rising to her feet ; and the pink shell-like colour brightened on her cheek, making her more than ever to Roland's eyes beautiful and lovable to look at. ' Where did you know him, Roland ? ' she went on after a moment's pause. ' What right have you to know such people ? ' ' He has often been up at the Darcys' villa.

He's been making a study of Violet — the one who is not out yet' ' Oh dear, it is exciting ! ' Helen repeated. ' But we shall be late for lunch. We must go back at once.' And poor Roland had to be satisfied with the few words, ' Perhaps some day, Roland,' as the only answer he would get that morning to all he had proffered to the creature who was, from a lover's point of view, the only woman in the world to him, so completely did she possess the affection and passion of his youth.

Chapter II

Sovereign Money gets a man Credit, creates Friends, stands in the place of Pedigree, and even of Beauty. — HORACE. Wealth is substantial good the Fates allot ; We know we have it, or we have it not. But all those graces, which men highly rate, Their minds themselves imagine and create. Crabbe. A lovely Being, scarcely form'd or moulded, A Rose with all its sweetest leaves yet folded. Byron. Helen was the youngest daughter of the rich banker Mr. Staunton, — the only daughter by his second marriage. Mr. Staunton's father had been a rich banker before him. He had lived in an important house in Russell Square, which residence Helen's father had inherited, together with a large estate in Sussex bought shortly before the old Mr. Staunton's death. In the house in Russell Square he and his first wife had lived, and his three daughters — Letitia, Agatha, and Caroline — had been born.

He had no son. The first Mrs. Staunton was an excellent wife and mother according to her lights. She had never failed to do her best for her husband and children in all that concerned worldly matters. She had a strong sense of duty though conceived on somewhat material lines. Early in life her principles had been formed. They had taught her that to promote the worldly prosperity of her own was her first duty in life ; and instilled into her very conscience was the aim of trying to make a very large income go as far as by industry and forethought it could be made to go. Before her three daughters 'came out,' the house in Russell Square was sold, and its owners and the riches spent therein removed to Belgrave Square. Poor Mrs. Staunton did not enjoy the more fashionable neigh bourhood to which her energy and worldly wisdom had transported her family, for long.

On her death Letitia her eldest daughter took up the reins of government in her stead, and worthily she fulfilled the office as head of the household. However, in the nature of her father there was a quantity unknown to the first Mrs. Staunton and her daughter Letitia. There was a certain love of beauty and a touch of ideality in this business man who had spent all his working life in Lombard Street and in the House of Commons which had never been evinced hitherto even in his home life ; but which, before long, brought a very new element into the Staunton family. Through some unfortunate banking transactions with her relations, Mr. Staunton became acquainted, not only with the affairs of a charming young lady, but with the young lady herself, — an orphan, by name Helen Vendolaine. She had aristocratic but not very respectable relations, and her affairs had suffered by reason of these relations and were in great confusion, and Helen Vendolaine was very poor in consequence when Mr. Staunton undertook to look into them.

In setting these business matters in right order, and in finding out how little she could look after them herself, the banker fell much in love with this refined and unbusiness like lady. The helpless grace of this offspring of the idle classes touched his sense of beauty and chivalry ; combined, as it was, with the complete trust and confidence she placed in him ; so, by the time her affairs had become arranged, he had wooed and won her, and a new Mrs. Staunton was installed as the mistress of the Belgrave Square mansion and the country house in Sussex. Letitia felt puzzled and rather sad. She had put much conscience and industry into the regulating of her father's establishments, and now he had chosen to place at their head one as incapable as a baby to rule over them in the same spirit of complete efficiency and regularity.

She found however, before long, that the change would not work out so disastrously as she had feared. The new Mrs. Staunton was graceful in nature and mind as well as in appearance and manner. From the first she had respected Mr. Staunton and had felt very grateful to him. Before long she loved him, — really loved him as her husband, — and was very happy as his wife, — happier than she had ever been in her life before. That no one should suffer for that happiness was a generous instinct which sprang up in her heart rather than a thought which came to her mind. For five years Letitia had ruled over the two establishments as their mistress. As little as possible should she feel any difference in her life now that a new mistress was installed, if this new mistress could pre vent it. To Helen Staunton's mind material matters took but a very vague and unimportant place in life.

They were little cared for, noticed, or understood. She had no definite views on the subjects which may be said to make the framework of life, — such as the way money should be spent, or money should be saved ; matters in fact touching the material wel fare of establishments and their ordinances ; whereas the first Mrs. Staunton and her daughter Letitia made a distinct point of everything which concerned these matters. What had cost much, or even any sterling coin of the realm held a distinct importance in both these ladies' calculations ; whereas to Helen Staunton things which were beautiful, whether they cost nothing, or a penny, or a pound, — feelings that gave others and herself pleasure, — in fact all things savouring of the ' sweetness and light ' of life, limited within an average intellectual horizon, were to her the truly import ant matters, the presence or absence of which made her days happy or unhappy.

So without any self-abnegation she sought to persuade Letitia to go on reigning over them all, herself included. ' Dear Letitia,' she had said with that mixture of humility and sincerity which finely-bred people can introduce into their manner with persuasive effect, ' what would your father do without you ? I should have made him miserable with all my stupidities and my not knowing anything about the sensible, practical things of life, if you had not been here to help me. It may seem lazy of me, but for his sake do go on just as you did before I came, and give me the things to do which you think I shan't dis astrously fail in, and I will do my very best to be a help in a small way.' Letitia, though she had a limited, had in no wise a small nature. She soon fully appreciated, though she could not have explained wThy, the refined element and generous fibre of her stepmother's nature, contrary though her ways were to those theories of what a woman's ways ought to be, which she had been brought up to believe in.

She cordially loved Mrs. Staunton, and when two years after his marriage her father was again left a widower, Letitia's grief at losing her stepmother was only second in intensity to her father's, and the little baby-girl that was left to them was mothered very tenderly by Letitia according to her powers. For her sisters Agatha and Caroline, and their social lives in London and in Sussex, she worked industriously, arranging that everything should be done efficiently which might help them to maintain the place on the social ladder in which the industry and talents of their father and mother had placed them. But the little baby half-sister touched a soft chord in Letitia's heart which neither of her own sisters had reached. It was truly a very unselfish life which this good woman lived. It is true she liked the power of governing well two large establishments, and she liked to exercise the efficiency which she possessed in so doing.

Do not we all enjoy doing what we can do well ? But so far as personally wishing to shine in all the social enjoyments which she organised for others, not for a moment did it enter into her scheme of life to wish to do so. All her functions as head of her father's house she performed as grave duties on the ground that the family's social welfare was promoted by such functions. Dinner-parties begot dinner-parties; therefore these were a worthy investment of a certain amount of money. A ball in like manner begot balls ; a box at the opera was the means of entertaining certain friends in the most successful manner. Every social arrangement was made on a scheme and a system, not certainly for her own pleasure, nor perhaps exactly for the pleasure of her sisters, but on the grounds of fulfilling duty in the station of life on the borderland of which it had pleased Providence to place the Staunton family by reason of great wealth.

Needless to say that neither the society in Belgrave Square nor in the im portant country house in Sussex had that quality of flexible charm which gives a pleasant flavour to enjoyable society. The meeting together of fellow-creatures for the refresh ing of mind and body was not the aim of Letitia's efforts. The second Mrs. Staunton's relations said that the Staunton society was dull because it was proper, but that was a calumny against propriety based on the improper proclivities of some of the second Mrs. Staunton's relations. If the Staunton society was dull it was so because it was planned on a theoretic basis and conceived in a commercial spirit ; not because the people who composed it were well-regulated domestic characters. Dull, ponderous, and without charm it certainly was, as all things are dull which are intended to be amusing and a source of relaxation, and which are worked at with all the grind and solemnity of a grave duty.

But behind this somewhat weighty and dull machinery for spending a large income was that something in the home which gave Letitia a touch of real unsophisticated human joy ; and this something was that little Helen and the love she felt for the small sister. This love made her life really the richer and the happier. Without tracing or analysing whence came the germ of this special affection which she felt for the little creature, she realised that it belonged to something outside the dry duties of life. That pretty touch of generosity, so spontaneous and uncalculating in the mother, when she felt that her own happiness was costing Letitia what Letitia cared for very much, was the first seed which produced this growth of love, and this growth of love developed into a real blessing for the motherless child.

However, even to herself, Letitia would maintain it was motives of pure duty which led her to spend so much time in the nursery, and as Helen grew up it was perhaps a hint of the fact that she was foolish about the child, and a consequent shyness, which made Letitia repress any sign of tenderness in her manner when with Helen, — reserve of feeling being almost part of the Staunton family code of duty. Nevertheless Letitia was more to the little girl than any one else in her home. However much it might be disguised there was nevertheless from very early days a consciousness in Helen that Letitia was quite weak in her affection for her. She felt very distinctly that she possessed a power over her capable elder sister. She could be naughtier with Letitia, she could tease her more consistently even than she could tease her nursery-maid, for she knew very well how easily she could make it all right by throwing her arms round Letitia's neck and putting her soft lips against the hard, rather shiny cheeks of her middle-aged sister.

Mr. Staunton was too busy a man to see much of his children. Besides his business as a banker he was a Member of Parliament, active on Committees, and industrious in carrying through schemes beneficial to the business world. Agatha and Caroline Staunton were young women who took very little notice of children. They were both sufficiently well educated and intelligent. Everything that money could buy, added to such education and intelligence, they enjoyed. There was no special distinction or originality in the nature of either lady which marred their appreciation of every social amusement afforded by ' good society ' in London. Miss Agatha and Caroline Staunton belonged to the type of young ladies not unfrequently to be met with in 'good,' though not brilliant society, — no longer very young, who always have tickets for everything, — the tickets which are given, and cannot be bought ; tickets for the Royal Institution ; tickets for private views ; tickets for the openings of institutions and launching of ships by royalties ; tickets for funerals in St. Paul's Cathedral and in Westminster Abbey, — in fact, tickets the obtaining of which proves that the obtainers enjoy the privileges of a wide acquaintance among 'important' people.

The Miss Stauntons industriously enjoyed all their rather select entertainments and insisted on being escorted to them as often as it was possible for him to do so by Mr. Charles Staunton, a clever bachelor uncle. Charles Staunton was a younger brother of Helen's father. He had not gone into the family bank. Helen's father had entered it while still in his teens, but Charles Staunton went to Oxford and then read for the bar, but had not practised ; for, like all the Stauntons, he was rich. His tastes were for literature, society, and family life ; but he was one of those men who prefer being a constant inmate of the families of their relations to having a family centre of their own. He was a bachelor by nature. He had comfortable lodgings in Chapel Street, Belgrave Square ; his Club was the Athenæum. and his most frequent haunt his brother's home.

Human nature under the social aspects of the London world interested him as a study. Every one told their secrets to Charles Staunton, for he was ever ready to listen ; showed no personal curiosity, and had never been known to let a secret out. Except concerning material matters the Staunton family could in no wise be called serious -minded. Religion, philanthropy, or high culture, — these, and the like, — were treated from a theoretic because from a surface point of view. Deep feelings had been aroused in Mr. Staunton and Letitia for Helen the wife, and for Helen, her child ; but the existence of feeling was never shown, nor even tacitly admitted as existing, in the family intercourse. As the young Helen grew up, without knowing what it was that it lacked, she felt the want of something in her family life.

This life was based on the laws of common sense and intelligence, not on those of uncommon sense and sensibility ; and Helen was by nature more of a Vendolaine than a Staunton, that meaning that she cared more for the poetry of life than for its prose. Still, as mind as well as body developed, Helen was felt to possess a stronger personality than her mother had owned. She inherited something of her father's critical ability and her idealistic tendencies were made definite and positive by a much stronger will and a more powerful reasoning capacity than her mother had possessed. There was nothing vague about Helen ; and very early in life her power of will and her reason took the form of resisting the ruling powers of the nursery. When she was not more than five years old a battle royal took place on the subject of pomade.

Letitia never could understand the uncommon, — and believed it to be generally in the wrong. Little Helen had a head of hair which was very uncommon and very beautiful ; but the lawlessness of its growth was looked on almost with solemnity by Letitia. It was so very queer! So pomade in quantities was ordained. Helen, with true Vendolaine instincts against law and ugliness, resisted the pomade ; and, when the nurse succeeded in putting some on, ran straight away to the housemaid's closet and put her head under the tap, turned the water on, and tried to wash it off. This rebellious action resulted in a cold in her head, and as she announced that every time pomade was put on her head she would go to the tap and wash it off, Letitia was fairly puzzled. Was it to be tidiness, pomade, and cold in the head, — or no cold, and a queer head of untidy hair !