The Honourable Ella. A tale of Foxshire

Book II. Chapter

I. LAPDOG, OR NOTHING ? pRAYE LODGE, situate in the park, -*— ' and about a mile and a half from the big house, was certainly, after its altera tions, a very perfect nest for a young couple. What the decorator from London called " all the latest improvements " were there, and, as Hazelhatch said, it only wanted lifts to take you to bed, and an VOL. H. B assortment of digestions kept in the dining-room, to make it quite perfect. Braye House had also been in the hands of the workmen ; all Lord Lorton's pet schemes, hitherto kept in check by prudent Mr. Graines, had been carried out ; a new steward's lodge and extra outbuildings had been erected ; the old billiard-table had been replaced by one which was worthy of Pratt's; and a covered lawn-tennis ground planned for the amusement of non-hunting winter days.

Lady Yiolet had revelled in an extra gay season, even in a ball at 47, Grosve nor Square ; and altogether, apart from other considerations, Hazelhatch could not but feel gratified by the evident pleasure his marriage had given to his family. The honeymoon was a roving one. Evelyn had seen but little of the Continent, and, though she cared not much for art, was ? 3 wise enough to affect a small amount of æstheticism, and was glad to have an op portunity for airing those accents upon which the professors at Miss Grandy's had so often congratulated her. Altogether, when they returned towards the end of August, and took possession of their house, she was well satisfied with herself and her surroundings, and quite convinced that she had made no mistake as to the character of the husband she had chosen.

Some one has observed that matrimony is a life-long duel. Evelyn soon saw that in this duel there could be no doubt as to which of them would come off conqueror. Partly from laziness, partly from generosity, partly from affection, and perhaps partly from weakness, Hazelhatch was, as she saw, ready to give in to her on every point, and, the proverb about two people riding a horse being undoubtedly true, she B settled herself down in front at once, and grasped the reins with steadfast hands. They were sitting one morning in the sunny room opening upon the lawn, which went by the name of her boudoir — though she was little likely to retire to bouder in solitude— Hazelhatch having just come in from that morning cigar with the horses which is indispensable to every hunting man. Evelyn, attired in the prettiest and freshest of summer gowns, was writing letters, and looking, as her husband thought, most provokingly bewitching with the tempered rays of the sun upon her gold-brown head, when she looked up and spoke.

"By-tke-bj-, Harry, did I tell you I had asked Mr. Hereward to come here ?" Just a suspicion of a frown gathered on his forehead, as he asked quickly — " No. Isn't it rather— soon ?" ? 5 "Soon?" ;'Well — it is so pleasant being alone together here, Evelyn." " So it is, Harry ; but you see your people all come home to-morrow, and Vio let writes me word that they are going to fill the house for the Foxshire races, so we shouldn't be alone much longer." " What a nuisance it is ! Nothing nice ever lasts," and he crossed the room, and put his arm round her waist. " I got Granville's answer this morning," she went on. " Granville ? — oh, Hereward." " Yes ; you know we were brought up together, so I can't remember to forget his Christian name. You don't mind, dear ?" " Mind ? Of course not," he said, kiss ing her ear, which, as she had turned away to find Hereward's letter, was all he could reach.

"He says he can come at once, having got a holiday ; so I suppose he will come down with your people to-morrow." " I'll send the dog-cart to meet him. I can ride over to Foxborough, to the magis trates' meeting." " No, dear ; it's too hot for you to do that. There's nothing so detestable as riding in the heat. No ; I'll drive my ponies to the station. They want exer cise. Tommy nearly kicked over the traces twice the other day." " Yes ; that'll do capitally. Then you can pick me up in the town. There'll be plenty of room for the boy and me in the back seat." "Very well," said his wife; but next day at breakfast she altered the plan. " We had better be independent of each other. Your ' indifferent justice ' may take no time, and I can't have you idling ? 7 about Foxborough half the day, sir, and making love to that pretty barmaid at ' The George.' You go in the dog-cart — by the way, don't forget to send the spring cart in for the luggage — and I'll drive my ponies.

Hazelhatch was in that stage of love when every hour away from the loved one is distasteful ; but he assented to this plan, and at three o'clock in the afternoon the inhabitants of Foxborough opened their eyes in admiration as the lovely lady drove her high-stepping bay ponies, at the rate of ten miles an hour, through the High Street and up to the railway station. In her arrangement Evelyn had two objects in view. One was to have a little quiet conversation with Hereward before he reached the Lodge ; and the other was at once to begin to accustom the Braye family to the idea of her intimacy with that young gentleman. She cared for him as much as it was in her nature to care for anyone, admiring his coarse good looks, his shrewdness, and his determination. In a certain sense he and she were (or had been) both adventurers, and that estab lished a kind of mutual regard ; and they also had in common a cynical contempt for others, and for the usually received code of morality, that still further drew them together.

Besides, she knew that he worshipped her with a passion that was stronger than even his desire to succeed in life ; and a woman likes a man no less for worshipping her. So she welcomed him as he came up to the carriage with her most genial smile. " How kind of you to come, Lady Hazel hatch !" " You must not call me that. We are ? 9 Evelyn and Granville still. Do you forget what I told you ?" At that moment Hereward would not have exchanged his position for a duke dom, or for the riches of a Rothschild. "Why, Evelyn, you here!" exclaimed Lord Lorton, bustling up in a white hat. " How well you are looking ! Quite cruel to us fagged and jaded Londoners — isn't it, Mr. Hereward ? Mary, dear, here's Evelyn." Evelyn's position in her pony-carriage rather interfered with Lady Lorton's effu sive embrace, which was watched with supreme interest by the porters and others who had been attracted to the station door by the sight of the Braye carriages.

" Mr. Hereward is going to the Lodge ?" asked Lady Violet, coming up, and looking very cross and dusty. "yes — our first visitor. You mustn't make us shy, Granville. I haven't quite learned yet to do properly what Miss Grandy used to call ' presiding at your own table.' " None of them noticed the slight ring of defiance in her voice as she said this, ex cept Hereward himself, and his heart again leapt for joy. "When are we to come and see you, dear?" asked Lady Lorton, as her footman suggested that the maid, bags, &c, had been safely stowed away in her carriage. " Oh, as soon as you can. I long to show you how charming it all is ! Come to-morrow, please." And after a few more words the ponies were set going, and, with Hereward beside her, she again rattled through the street. They did not speak till they had cleared the town, and then she said, ? 11 " I am glad to have been able to see you before you saw Harry."

" Why ?" " Well, because I want you, while here, to exercise a particular virtue of yours." " Which one ?" "Caution." "I don't think you need impress that upon me." " Don't you ? Have you ever heard that the world is censorious ?" "It has been remarked in my hearing." "And that a county world is doubly so?" "That also is an observation I have heard, and read." " Perhaps you think my asking you down here so soon, and coming to meet you, when I knew they all would be at the station, is a proof that I do not practise what I preach to you ?" " Do I ? I scarcely know. I only know that you are more lovely than ever !" " I am glad you think so. It is good to be lovely." " Then you must be good indeed !" " Now, look here, Granville — woa, Tom my ! — if you are to be my friend for the future " "If?"

"You must remember that I am — no longer Evelyn Feyler." "I am not likely to forget it." " That's not so certain. I want a friend. It may sound odd that I should, situated as I am, but I do. You can be that. You and I know each other so well, have known each other so long, that I should be sorry to think we couldn't be friends ; but " "But what?" he asked, as she paused. " But you must not try to be anything ■else." ? 13 " Is that what you meant that morning at Stanesby ?" " I don't quite know what I meant then. It is what I mean now." " You are hard to understand." "No, I'm not, and you understand me perfectly. I'm very fond of Harry — of my husband." " Indeed ?" "It's unconventional — I'll allow that. But it pleases me to be unconventional." "It is very pretty.'' " If you sneer, sir, I'll send you away to-morrow morning.

Now, I want to have you as my friend, without making him un comfortable." "I will study Plato before I sleep to night. I daresay you can lend me the works of that philosopher." She rather enjoyed the bitterness of his tone, but said, " I told you I would not allow you to sueer. Listen to me, and be obedient. Nothing nice in this world can be had without a drawback. Your friendship will be nice." " And the drawback ? " We shall be what is called ' talked about.' There are plenty of old cats about here, with nothing else to do but to talk. It is a necessary evil, and I am prepared to accept it. But the talk, the suspicion, or whatever you may like to call it, must not extend to Harry, or to his family. Do you understand me ?" " You wish me to be so decidedly a lapdog that they cannot possibly mistake me for any nobler species of dog ?"

" That's about it," she assented, laughing. "And if I refuse?" " Then I must do without a dog at all But why should you refuse ?" LAPDOG, OR NOTHING ? 15 " Did you ever read of Tantalus ?: " No ; but he can have nothing to do with the question, which is essentially one pertaining to this nineteenth century of ours." " I should like to be able to refuse," he said, half to himself, looking at her perfect profile. "Listen, Granville, while I tell you an allegory. You see these two ponies : well, after lunch I generally take them a lump of sugar each. If I gave both lumps to one the other would fret, wouldn't he ?" " I don't think much of your allegory. Put it that you gave one a lump of sugar and the other a stone resembling sugar." It was, perhaps, a relief to Evelyn that the ponies here caused a diversion by shy ing violently at an old woman gathering sticks in the ditch — for allegories are some times ticklish things to manage — and before they could resume their conversation they had entered the park, and she occu pied the remainder of the drive in pointing out the various points of interest in it to her companion.

Hazelhatch received his guest with much geniality. Any friend of Evelyn's must have something good in him, he thought, though at present he was inclined to dis like Hereward's half humble, half self asserting manner, the awkwardness of which the other's easy courtesy seemed rather to intensify. It was rather up-hill work in the smoking-room at night, as the two men had but little in common — save a feeling that one of them little suspected in the other — and Hereward, bred up to be cautious, did not expand under the influence of tobacco and brandy-and-seltzer, as men are apt to do, and sometimes to tell secrets the divulgence LAPDOG, OR NOTHING ? 17 of which they bitterly repent in the wisdom of the morning's wakening. Still Hazel hatch respected his wife for sticking by her old friends, and felt ashamed of himself for thinking the other a snob.

" After all," as he said to himself, " what right have I to set a man down as a snob, when I don't even know exactly what I mean by the term ? He's twenty times as clever as I am, and, just because he doesn't happen to have that tact which is so really unimportant, I arrogate to myself the right to look down upon him. And yet — by Jove ! the fellow is a snob for all that — and I wish Evelyn was not so fond of him." Just before they had left the drawing room to put on their smoking garb, Evelyn had found an opportunity, while her husband lit her candle, to have a word in private with Hereward. VOL. II. c " Lap-dog, or nothing ?" she asked, as he held her hand to wish her good night. "If I can be nothing else — lap-dog," he said, and was rewarded with a glance that set the blood tingling in his veins. " Lap-dog !" he muttered to himself, as he put on a gorgeous dressing-suit. " Lap dog, eh? She shall find that even lap dogs have teeth !"

Chapter II

ella's workbox. A T Castle Dorington it was their habit -*-■*- when alone — and they were often alone — to use Ella's own sitting-room principally; the drawing-room being rather large and dreary for two persons, while the former chamber was bright and snug. Mr. Bannerburn — or Lord Dorington, as we have forgotten to call him lately — had of course his own sanctum, sacred to un moved and undusted litter of paper and grimy books with markers in them ; sacred to genealogies and family trees, with copi ous notes added in his old-fashioned hand, c2 pointing out discrepancies and hitting off weak points ; and above all sacred to the grand monarch of the genealogical forest, portrayed in all its grandeur on parch ment, and taking up nearly one whole side of the wall : the tree that showed how the race of Bannerburn was not far inferior in antiquity to that Welsh family immortal ised in song, whose progenitor " Married Noah's daughter, And nearly spoiled ta flood By drinking up ta water."

In Ella's boudoir the nick-nacks did not differ much from those which ordinarily ornament a girl's room, though perhaps the library was a little " mixed." " Kate Coventry" jostled Mr. William Morris, and the inimitable "Jorrocks" rubbed shoulders with Mrs. Gaskell in a highly reprehensible manner ; while Mr. Robert son's Sermons almost elbowed "Adam Bede " out of his place on the shelf. On the walls too a similar mingling of tastes might be observed. A charming angelic figure faced the portrait of a favourite hunter ; while an impossible gentleman on an impossible horse, leaping high over an impracticable fence, with the apparent certainty of alighting on a pack of impossible hounds at least three hun dred yards below him, was balanced on the other side of the chimney-piece by an engraving of " The Christian Martyr."

Nevertheless — pace the . sage-green school of High Art — Ella's little snuggery al ways looked very bright and cheery ; and, if the natural flowers with which she deck ed it were not formal or ugly enough to please some æsthetic eyes, there were plenty among those favoured ones ad mitted within its door who declared that, with the owner in it, there was not a prettier sight to be found in all Foxshire. She is sitting alone there to-day, reading and re-reading a certain letter, the appearance of which would lead you to suppose that the process has been gone through very often before. As she reads, the tears every now and then fall from her eyes. The first bitterness of her self sacrifice has passed, but she still insists on inflicting on herself that kind of miserable happiness which arises from the contem plation of the " might-have-been " which can never be.

Suddenly the door opened, and she thrust into her work-box, which was on the table at her side, the precious docu ment. " My dear," said her father, entering the room, " I got a line from Hazelhatch this morning, saying that there must be no ceremony between such old friends as we are, and that, without waiting for our call, Lady Hazelhatch will drive over this afternoon and pay us a visit. You know her, I think ?" " Yes, papa." " She is — notwithstanding her disad vantages — ladylike, I am told ?" " Oh, yes ; she is quite — ladylike." " You do not speak very cordially, my child. Perhaps I could scarcely wish you to. Yet, Ella, remember that in a case like this the past must be absolutely and entirely put aside. Your pride demands that ; if not only for yourself, for me, for your family, too."

"It is put aside — entirely," said Ella, glancing at the work-box. " More than this, Ella. Not only must it be put aside in the sight of others — that, indeed, goes without saying in my daughter — but it must be forgotten by yourself." " It is not so easy to forget, papa." "It is easy to forget," he said, rather fiercely. " You know — or rather you can never quite know — how much I have had to forget. But I have forgotten it. It is to me as if it had never been." " 1 will try." " Try ! Ella, do you not see how hu miliating this persistent sorrow — this shut ting of yourself up — is ? Are you grieving for a man who is married to another ?" " No, father !" she exclaimed, with a touch of his manner. " No ! I am griev ing not for him, but for the loss of my own love." " Love ! Let it go ! When love is given to an unworthy object it ceases to be a worthy feeling."

" That can scarcely be." "It is so, child. Honour, justice, and " But at this moment Lady Hazelhatch's pony carriage whirled past the window on its way to the front door, and Mr. Banner burn forgot his lecture. " I cannot see her," said Ella, rising, and turning pale. " Not see her ! Ella, I am ashamed of you." "Oh! must I, father?" "You will receive Lady Hazelhatch," said Mr. Bannerburn, in his grand, austere manner, " as a Bannerburn should receive a neighbour. Her false position — for it is false, after all ; like should wed with like — will, no doubt, embarrass her. It is for you to put her at her ease. I will just take off my working-coat, and will join you here in a few moments." Ella, left alone, hesitated a few mo ments, looked in the glass, and, perceiving the redness of her eyes, dashed upstairs to attempt to do away with these traces of weakness ; and Lady Hazelhatch was shown into the room.

After glancing round — first, of course, into the mirror — she sat down in the chair Ella had occupied, and absently began to play with the contents of the work-box. As she did so, the letter Ella had hastily put into it came uppermost, and Evelyn noticed with a start her husband's handwriting : — "Ella dear, I love you, and you only. I would a million times prefer any poverty with you to any riches with another wo man. ... I feel that I am on the brink of a precipice. Put out your hand and save me. . . . Without you I care little what may happen — without you nothing would be more important to me than ob liging my family in this matter. But you will save me, will you not? . . . Remember, if you do not, the consequences wall be partly your fault." Those who admiredLady Hazelhatch — and who did not? — would scarcely have believ ed the evidence of their sense of sight could they have seen her when she carefully replaced the letter in the work-box, taking pains to hide it underneath the litter, as it had before been hidden.

Her eyes had in them a spirit of malignant rage that would have alarmed the most desperate lady killer ; her cheeks and lips were ashy white, her white teeth were clenched, her hands trembled with passion. Only for a moment. The door opened, and Lady Hazelhatch, turning to Ella with her most gracious smile, said, " My dear Miss Bannerburn, it is so kind of you to allow me to waive formality and come to see you. But then, you know, we are to be great friends — are we not?" "I hope so, Lady Hazelhatch," said Ella, not unimpressed by the other's cordiality. " Oh, no, not Lady Hazelhatch. I can't get accustomed to the name at all; and with you — if you won't think me pre sumptuous — I should like to be Evelyn. May I call you Ella ? I know you are an old friend of Harry's, and his old friends are mine now, you see.

I only wish Castle Dorington and Braye were a little nearer to each other. But we must obviate that by your often coming to stay with us. You will, won't you ?" " I am afraid I can scarcely leave my father often." " He must come too. There are a lot of quaint old books in the library at the House, which I am sure would amuse him. Oh ! how do you do, Lord Dorington ? I was just telling Ella — you see, we have made friends already — that she must often come to see us ; and I am going to try to bribe you to come too." " There is scarcely any bribe required, Lady Hazelhatch," said he, wTith old fashioned gallantry. " Oh ! we should bore you to death ! But, really, as I was saying when you came in, there is a heap of old manuscripts and books at Braye House which no one is clever enough there to appreciate ; and any one having a library such as I hear you have, Lord Dorington, would, I believe, find some treasures there."

He was pleased, both by the mention of his title, which was not often given him, and by the compliment to his library, of which he was a little vain. " Any time, when you have room for a useless old book-worm, I shall be glad to accept your invitation." " And you will often spare Ella for a few days to stay with us ?" He glanced at his daughter "Certainly. Indeed, Lady Hazelhatch, she shuts herself up% too much. I want her to take the little gaiety the county affords; and, now that we have so charming an addition to our society, there is all the more reason for her to go into it." " There, Ella ! You see you are beaten. Two to one against you. You'll have to sacrifice yourself on the altar of Society after all. Indeed I can understand all the same how, with such a delicious old place as this, you should not care to leave it.

Isn't the house very old, Lord Doring ton ?" " Tradition says," began the old man — but we will not inflict his account of the fortunes of Castle Dorington upon our readers, who perhaps are not all endowed with the patience of Evelyn Hazelhatch, when she had an object to gain. Suffice it to say that, when at last she departed, Mr. Bannerburn declared that he had not often met so sensible and high-bred a young woman. " There must be some mistake about her birth," he said ; "or else she is the excep tion to prove the rule as to blood. She seems aristocratic to her singer-tips, and I cannot imagine a better manner ; at her ease without being self-assertive, and quiet without being dull ; witty, too. without flip pancy, and graceful without affectation. I should like you to be friends with her, Ella.

She would do you good." " I am sorry you think my manners so bad, papa." "My dear, that is a silly speech. We all are capable of improvement, and I must say that the society of an agreeable, wellinformed, well-mannered woman is always a good thing for a girl." " We are the same age." " Yes, but marriage makes a great difference. Poor Ella thought it did make a great difference, but said nothing ; and her father went back to his books, putting away into a pigeon-hole the papers on which were noted down his late discoveries tending to the detriment of the Braye genealogy, and congratulating himself that Ella had found a friend who would be likely to take her a little out of herself. " She will soon get over the pain of seeing them together," he thought ; "and, after all, there could be no fitter house for a Bannerburn to visit than that of the Lortons."

As Evelyn drove home, every word of the letter she had read stood out clearly in her memory : — " I feel that I am on the brink of a precipice. Put out your hand to save me . . . obliging my family." He had married her, then, to " oblige his family!" She was the "precipice" from which Ella's hand might have saved him ! For the first time in her life Evelyn felt the sickening pang of jealousy. For there can be in some natures furious jealousy without much love. Harry she had looked upon as so entirely her own, and so thoroughly at her feet : and yet just before she had consented to make him happy, when she was acting her part so beautifully, and he was yielding to the spell, he was writing to this girl to " save him." He also was acting, to " oblige his family !" She had only gained him because Ella had refused to do so.

" Remember, if you do not, the conse quences will be partly your fault." D VOL. "Yes," said Evelyn to herself, jerking at the reins as the ponies shied, " the conse quences shall be your fault, and they shall be more bitter than either of you imagined."

Chapter III. The Triumph Of Tact

" TT'S a big thing," said Mr. Feyler, *■ standiug before the fireplace in his office, with his thumbs in his armholes ; "a precious big thing. But I don't quite like it." "Too big for you?" said Hereward, who was sitting astride a chair, smoking a cigarette. " Shall I take it somewhere else ? There are plenty of houses that would jump at it." "No. Don't be so hasty, Granville. You can't expect a man to go in for millions with the same ease and the same d carelessness as he would buy an orange. I don't like the prospectus." " Why not ?" " It isn't — well, it isn't exactly true." "What is truth?" asked the other, echoing the celebrated question, which now, as then, remained unanswered. Then he went on — " There's ordinary truth and City truth. This is quite true enough for the City — that is, with your name to back it."

" Some of the men in it are precious shady." " Your name will illuminate the whole thing ; will dazzle people so that they will look no further. Look here, Feyler. I know you are a rich man ; but I also know that things haven't been going quite straight with you lately." " That's because you left me." " Many thanks for the compliment. Perhaps it is. Anyhow, I make up for all sins of omission by bringing you this mag nificent chance. Take the ball at the hop, Feyler, and I give you my word you'll be the richest man of the lot in a year's time. You never used to be so over-scrupulous." " No more I am now ; but people are getting stupid and unpleasant notions into their heads as to what they call ' com mercial morality ;' and, mind you, Gran ville, I've no fancy for a criminal prosecu tion." " Criminal prosecution be d d !