I, too. A novel in two books, etc

Front matter

I, TOO PRINTED BY SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE LONDON URSULA. I, TOO. A NOVEL IN TWO BOOKS. BY MRS GERARD FORD. WITH AN ILLUSTRATION BY FLORENCE M. COOPER LONDON : SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, HAMILTON, KENT & CO. Lid. 1892. All rights reserved. Book First GIRLHOOD AA'ith wondering eyes and lips apart, A maid on life's wide threshold stands, AVith rosy cheeks and bounding heart, AA'ith timid mien and outstretched hands, Oh ! golden day, oh ! happy hours, Oh ! life all sunshine, song, and flowers. B

Chapter I

This is my birthday. I am twenty-one to-day. Arthur says I ougft now to consider myself to be 'entering into womanhood.' I don't the least. I knoAv I am getting very old. Ethel Bramwell was married last week, and she is only eighteen. I feel far too young to marry yet, and I never shall marry — never. Arthur and I are so happy together, so perfectly happy, and there are lots of married people ahvays bickering and quarrelling, and saying more cruel things to each other than the most bitter enemies could find to say. I wonder why that is ? I have often wondered about it. It seems to me that if I were a wife it would be degrad ing myself to speak contemptuously of my husband, and I don't think I ever could learn to hate the man who had been so much to me. Perhaps it is that people marry the wrong hus bands and wives, and then they find it out, and every day the union becomes more and more B I, TOO 4 irksome.

It embitters them, and they visit upon each other the fruits of the mistake they have made. I don't think I could bear it. I think I would rather die than live on bound to a man I could neither love nor honour. The reason I am beginning a diary is that last night we finished reading together our great grandmother's journal. It is yellow with age. She kept it many years — from the day she married, till a week before she died. Arthur did not let me read it all. He keeps it locked up with his private papers, and he doled it out to me a few pages at a time. He says Avhen I am married I shall read it all, and that until then I could not understand it. My great grand mother's name was Ursula too. I am called after her. She was the Lady Ursula, the Earl of Chollerford's daughter. Much of it is so bright and witty, and so full of life and love and tenderness ; and there are some parts so sad and bitter that when I laid the last sheets down, written with a weak and trembling* hand, the tears came into my eyes.

Life seems so bright and gay to me that I cannot bear to think it was so disappointing and sad to her ; yet she had much to make her happy. We are very insatiable ! I, TOO 5 Arthur says that this old diary is really good as a piece of literature, and so full of character, and that some of the ideas are so advanced for the time at which it was written that he will amuse himself by preparing it for publication. It was begun about the time of the French Revolution, when all thinking people were roused into excitement, when all Europe was in a ferment, and private lives seemed full of the stir and horror of that awful time. He says he will search out all particu lars of the many people, English and French, whom she mentions, and that he will make copious notes to explain any reference that in the diary is a little obscure.

He thinks it will be really both interesting and historically useful. I am so glad he will do this, because sometimes he gets a little restless, and often rather sad, as though our humdrum life, which to me is so perfect, were not enough for him. I never used to notice it, but now I do. Girls are very selfish, and thoughtless, and blind. We sat talking of old Lady Ursula's diary a good time after we finished reading it, and Arthur said he always enjoyed reading diaries, because one could trace the real character I, TOO os the writer in them, and he found such an interest in watching the development of their opinions and their lives and friendships. Suddenly he turned to me and said : ' You should begin a diary now you are entering into womanhood, little woman.' ' I am too lazy,' I said, laughing. ' It would amuse us to read it when we are old folks, wouldn't it ?' he said. ' But if I am to show it to you always, it would not be quite ' ' Oh, no, don't show it to me, not every day ; that would spoil it.

You may want to relieve your feelings now and then by giving your tyrant of a brother a good wigging. It Avould stay your hand if you thought I was to read it. But when we are old grey-heads we can sit in the chimney-corner and read about the days when we were young — when you were, at all events.' Then Mr. Harland came into the room, and Arthur told him what we had been talking of; and he took it up quite seriously, and said he thought it was a very good idea indeed, and that he was sure I would do it well, and that we must not wait till we were grey-heads to read it. Then he laughed and passed his hand I, TOO 7 through his hair, and said, ' If you read it aloud to me when I am a grey-head you won't have long to wait.' I looked up at him, and saw the grey hairs very thickly scattered among the black.

He is only about Arthur's age, and yet he looks many years older. They are both twelve years older than I am, but Arthur and I are companions and chums in everything, while Mr. Harland seems to be far older and graver than either of us. Sometimes I think he has a kind of affectionate contempt for us both. Men that live in London do get older and graver than men in the country, and they are cleverer and more thoughtful, more ' cute and artful,' as Arthur says. Then he is a lawyer, and being a lawyer seems to make a man enjoy life less somehow. There ! how they would both laugh if I read that to them, for the only lawyer I ever knew at all well is Mr. Harland. I must not go off into generalities, and think I am speaking of the whole legal world when I am only speaking of Mr. Harland. He seems always to be looking for motives and finding out reasons, reducing everything to logic.

He seems not to understand at all that people often have no motive in doing or saying I, TOO things, and that often the very opposite will happen from what one expected. This morning, when they were going out to ride, I told Arthur to ask Archie Thornhill to dinner to-night, if he had no engagement. When they came in, Mr. Harland asked me why I wanted Archie to come. ' I don't know,' I said, laughing. ' You must have had some reason for it,' he said. ' Well, because it is my birthday.' ' You knew a long time ago it would be your birthday to-day : you could have asked him a week since.' ' Perhaps I ought to have done so,' I said. ' Why didn't you ? ' ' Oh, I never thought about it. He wasn't alone then — all the others were there.' ' I see. Didn't want father and mother and sisters as well ; only Archibald.' ' Really,' I said, ' I never thought about it at all till you and Arthur set off to ride.

I don't give endless care and thought to all the trifles of life.' ' I wonder if you ever think at all ? ' he said. ' Not much. I am far too happy to think.' I, TOO 9 I sat down in a low window seat and looked out. Everything is so fresh and beautiful. April is a lovely month. I think I like it all the better because it is so changeable. There is already a thin film of green over some of the trees, and those that are not green are red and purple at the tips of the twigs. Oh ! it is all so bright and dreamy and beautiful, and I am young, and strong, and very happy. Mr. Harland leaned against the window frame opposite to me and looked out too, and when I turned my eyes away from the sunshine to his face — for I was surprised he did not speak, he generally catches one up so quickly — I wondered what he was thinking about.

I think he is an ugly man ; but I know him so well, and have known him all my life, so that it is difficult to tell what he would be like to anyone who had never seen him. Yet I know Arthur better far, and I never see Arthur without knowing how handsome he is. But Arthur is fair, and has bright hair and blue eyes, and his forehead that is shaded by his hat is as white as mine. I am fair too, and I like fair people best. Mr. Harland is dark, big, and strong, almost burly. He would be much better-looking if he would hold himself straighten It seems almost as if I, TOO he didn't want people to see how tall he is, because he always will slouch.- It makes him look older, too, especially with the grey in his hair. I think, but I am no judge — I think he has good eyes. They are hazel, and big, and far apart, and they are always very clear, and look very straight at you, as if they saw into you somehow and read more than other people's. The eyes now were staring straight away right over my head into the blue distance, and there was some thing in them that made me say with a sudden impulse that I regretted afterwards : ' Mr. Harland, you are not happy ? ' and I laid my hand lightly on his arm.

He took it in his for a moment, and looked at it, as if a hand were a new kind of animal. ' It is such a bit of a thing,' he said. ' You are not happy ? ' I repeated, drawing my hand away. ' My dearest child,' he said, lightly, ' when you are my age you will not wonder at people not being happy.' I hate him to call me ' dearest child.' He often does, and it always sounds a sort of tra vesty of the words. It always sounds like ' you little fool.' ' But we are, Arthur and I,' I said. I, TOO 11 ' You are,' he said. ' Arthur has tasted un happiness, poor chap.' ' Arthur ! ' I repeated in surprise. ' Yes ; ask him to tell you about it, it would do him good. I had a long talk with him to-day about you.' ' About me ! ' ' Yes ; was that wonderful ? I was telling him that now you are a woman' — he looked down at me quizzically — ' now you are a woman you ought to see the world.

He ought not to shut you up any longer ; he must bring you to London, and let you have some gaiety and society.' ' But we are perfectly happy,' I said again. ' I don't want to change our "way of life" at all' ' I told him ' — he went on, just as if I had not spoken — ' I told him you liked it well enough now, never seeing anyone but him and Archi bald Thornhill & Co., and myself, but that in a few years you would be angry and give him a piece of your mind on the subject, and ask him why he had immured you like a nun during the days of your youth and beauty. For some day you will wake up, and find you are no longer a pretty young lady.' He turned his eyes upon me now, I, TOO and looked at me with a smile — he has a dreadfully ironical smile, and I always feel, in spite of myself, that I amuse him.

I do think he looks upon me as a kind of kitten. ' I have never discovered yet that I am a pretty young lady,' I said, feeling cross and annoyed at his coming and interfering with our happy, quiet lives. ' You are young,' he said. ' Not so very. I am twenty-one now.' ' Still it cannot be called elderly, can it ? Come here.' He held out his hand, and I put mine into it. He led me to a long looking-glass between the windows. ' Look at yourself ; you are very pretty.' ' I wish I could see it,' I said, and I looked steadily at myself. ' I have a good clear skin, and I look healthy and young, but I cannot see that I am pretty. I don't think I am pretty,' I said, looking at him in the glass as he towered above me. And then, partly to tease him, for he never can resist snubbing me, I put my hands to my waist and said, as I waltzed away, ' But my figure isn't bad.' ' Not thoroughly bad,' he laughed, ' but you are far too small to have any figure worth men tioning.' I, TOO 13 At that moment Arthur came in, and caught me as I passed and waltzed round with me. ' So you two are quarrelling again,' he said, as we stopped opposite to Harland. ' Oh ! he is such an old bear, Arthur,' I said. ' I have just been paying you a compliment,' said Mr. Harland. ' Was that particularly bearish?' ' You were so careful to administer the an tidote immediately afterwards that I have for gotten the flaA-our of it,' I said.

Then I looked up and they were both looking at me just as if they had never seen me before, thoughtfully, critically. ' Anyone Avouid imagine,' I said, ' that be cause I am twenty-one to-day some great change had taken place in my appearance.' ' In your position,' said Mr. Harland. ' You are no longer a legal nonentity. You are now, in the eye of the law, a responsible being, with a will and mind of your own.' ' I don't see that it alters my position,' I said. Then they both got very solemn, and Ave had a long business talk, the first business talk of my life. They told me I would have lots of papers to sign ; and they told me a great many things Avhich I have forgotten already. The chief I. too 14 thing I remember is that I am to have a cheque book of my own. I shall like that, it is a swagger kind of thing to have.

It was Mr. Harland told me the most of the business part. Arthur is like me, he does not care a bit for business, and Mr. Harland does it all. He and Arthur are my guardians, or Avere ; now, as Mr. Harland says, they are going ' to wash their hands of me.' We talked on till luncheon was announced. They were laughing at me because I said I was glad I should have my own cheque-book, but Mr. Harland suddenly became quite grave and said, ' You must both set to work and make your wills at once.' Arthur said : ' Yes, indeed I ought to have done that long ago,' and I laughed and said it seemed so odd for young people to make wills. We settled that Mr. Blake is to come out from Loughton, and we are both to make our wills while Mr. Harland is here to help us. ' Really, old fellow,' said Arthur, laughing, ' it is lucky for us you are not yet as celebrated as you ought to be, or what would become of us ?

When you are a Q.C., and blossom into a judge, we shall have to shift for ourselves. And he put his arm affectionately through I, TOO 15 Mr. Harland's as we walked into the dining room. ' It is vacation time, you see,' said Mr. Har land, ' and you don't know how many briefs I have up-stairs to digest in the small hours of the night' It has been a very happy, peaceful day. Archie came to dinner, and afterAvards it was so fine, and the moon — the Easter moon — was so bright, that we all went out and strolled up and down on the terrace. I walked with Mr. Harland, because there Avere two or three things I wanted him to ex plain to me. I like talking to him when he will be serious, but generally he treats me like a very young and rather foolish child. Yet through it all there is a sense of sadness, I don't know what it is quite.

He was very kind to-night. He is to be my executor, and he is to be Arthur's, too. He says my will will be far longer than Arthur's, because I want to leave so many annuities to my poor people. He took out his pocket-book and jotted it all down, and said I must not trouble any more about it — that he would arrange it all. I had been thinking of Arthur all day, since I, TOO Mr. Harland spoke about him in the morning, about his having ' tasted unhappiness,' and I wanted to ask him about it. We were at the end of the terrace, and had rested there, so that he might use the wall as a desk. The moon was so bright, he said he could see quite well, and that he was not writing, only making hieroglyphics, which he would interpret before he went to bed. ' Mr. Harland,' I said, as he put away his pocket-book and lit his cigar — he knows I like the smell of tobacco — ' I want you to tell me about Arthur, and what made him unhappy ? ' At that moment Arthur called out to us, ' Archie and I are going to have a game of billiards, so you will know where to find us,' and they went in. ' I think he had better tell you himself,' he said. ' What was it about ?

Was it father's death ? ' Father died about eight years ago. Mother died when I was born. ' No,' he said, ' it was not that at all. That is not the kind of trouble that leaves a mark on a man's life.' ' Tell me what it Avas,' I asked again. ' My dearest child,' he said, shrugging his I, TOO 17 shoulders, ' it was what is called a disappointment ; he loved a lady who didn't loA*e him — or fancied he did, which is much the same thing.' ' I can't imagine anyone not loving Arthur,' I said, ' especially when he loved her.' ' I can't explain it to you,' Mr. Harland said in that kind of careless voice he uses sometimes Avhen he is speaking of a thing that does not interest him ; it was such a very different tone from the one he had used in the morning when he spoke of Arthur. He stopped to knock off the end of his cigar, and I stopped too. ' I hate to hear you speak like that of Arthur,' I said, hotly. ' I didn't say anything disrespectful, did I ?

What a little spitfire ! ' ' It was your tone. I wanted to know about it. It hurts me to think of Arthur having suffered.' ' He did suffer,' Mr. Harland said. ' I suppose you don't remember it ? ' ' No, when was it ? ' ' About seven years ago, I think. But ask him about it ; it will do him all the good in the world to tell you. These imaginary sorrows melt away when they are talked of.' c I, TOO ' Imaginary ? ' I said. ' Love is a kind of superstition,' he said, ' that kind of love. It has no real existence.' ' I thought it was a great power,' I said ; ' I am sure it is.' ' Have you ever felt it ? ' he asked, but he did not wait for an answer, he knew I never had. ' Take my advice, Ursula, and don't let yourself drift away into imagining you are in love. Nothing mars so many lives ; it is pure nonsense, simple imagination.

Come to me when you think yourself in love, and tell me all about it, and I'll tell you what to do.' He was not laughing now, but speaking quite seriously. ' It is sensitive people like you and Arthur who really suffer from these delusions. There is no such thing on earth as love — of that kind ! ' ' Perhaps it has not yet come your way,' I said, and I could not help thinking as I looked at his strong, manly figure and powerful, intel lectual face, that when it did come it would be something so great and so passionate that he would never mistake it for a delusion. ' No, it hasn't,' he said. ' I am thirty-three, and I can truthfully say I have never yet en countered this magic power that poets and novelists talk about. I don't believe in it.' He I, TOO 19 threw the end of his cigar away, and leaned over the balustrade, and looked out over the little winding river and the woods and hills. 'Still,' I said, 'Arthur has felt it, and it seems to me, I seem to feel it in my soul, that there is such a thing.' ' You seem to feel it in your soul ! ' He laughed quite a hearty roar of laughter. ' Well done, Nutty,' he said, as he always does when I make a particularly stupid speech. ' That is exactly what it is, people seem to feel it in their souls.' ' You are very rude,' I said.

I felt angry that he could laugh so heartily about anything connected with Arthur. ' You must try to forgive me,' he said, following me, for I had turned quickly towards the house. I was just going in when he stopped me. He laid one great hand on each of my shoulders and said, ' Don't go and throw yourself away on some worthless fellow, just because he tells you he is in love with you. You are a rich Avoman, and men find it easy to fall in love with rich women.' ' Am I rich ? ' I said. ' I had never thought of it before.' c I, TOO ' You are not a pauper,' he said, laughing ; ' you may be said to be in a state of genteel poverty, perhaps.' Since I came to bed I have been sitting at the window in the moonlight thinking of these things, and wondering if he is right. He is far cleverer than either Arthur or me, and knows far more of the world.

Still I do think there must be some reality in love. I do feel in my soul, in spite of Mr. Harland's laughter, that there is a latent power and strength there that would paralyse every other power if once it awoke and sprang into life. I feel it in my soul, and it makes me half afraid. I, TOO 21

Chapter II

Yesterday I never wrote in my diary, because it was such a busy day and very late when I came to bed, and I felt too tired to write. We made our wills, and they were signed and witnessed in the library very solemnly. Mr. Blake and his son were here all day ; they dined with us, and then drove off in the moonlight, taking our wills with them. The wind was east, and it was very cold. When they had gone, I ran into the library and threw more wood upon the fire, and sat down on a low seat in front of it to toast myself. Mr. Harland and Arthur were still standing in the hall talking business. It was business, business, from morning till night. Mr. Harland is very kind, and it never seems a trouble to him to do anything for Arthur. 'Come, come!' I called. 'You have talked enough about deeds for one day.

Do come and be cosy by this lovely fire ! ' I, TOO 22 They came in still talking, but I ran and put my hand on Arthur's lips, and told him he might begin again to-morrow, but we had had enough business for one day. I sat down again in my low rocking-chair, and they took their usual seats, one at each side of me. ' You say your London house is let on lease ? ' said Mr. Harland. ' Yes, a seven-years' lease ; it has been let five, so it will soon be on my hands again.' ' Well, you must go to a hotel when you come up next month,' he said. ' Next month ! Are we going to London next month ? ' ' Harland says I ought to have taken you long ago, little woman,' said Arthur. ' He says I ought to have shown you the world.' ' I think I should like to see London,' I said, looking into the fire. ' It will be charming to show the child the sights of London,' said Mr. Harland. ' Fancy the delight of taking her to the Tower, and St. Paul's, and the British Museum.' ' And Westminster Abbey, and the Mint, and the Zoo,' I said, laughing.

We all laughed. I had often wanted to see I, TOO 23 these places, but I never had expressed any wish on the subject, for we were so happy, and I knew instinctively that Arthur did not care to leave home. We chatted on for more than an hour, plan ning the most delightful two months of gaiety and sightseeing in London. Mr. Harland was quite like a child with a new toy ; I never saw him so much interested in anything. ' Are you sure you will like it, Arthur ? ' I asked after a time. ' Yes, I am sure I shall. I have been self indulgent too long ; I ought to have taken you before.' ' I am very glad you didn't,' I said. ' I am sure I could not have enjoyed things so much two or three years ago as I can now.' ' By the way, Harland, ought she not to be presented ? ' ' Yes ; I never thought of it. Of course she must be.

Who will do it ? ' ' I don't know,' said Arthur. ' You see I have got out of the way of seeing any of our neighbours for such a long time. There is Mrs. Bramwell — or Mrs. Thornhill would pre sent her, I am sure, with her own daughter.' ' Is it necessary ? ' I asked. I, TOO 24 ' Positively,' said Mr. Harland. ' Well, then, I'll tell you who I should like to do it better than anyone else.' ' Who ? ' they both said at once. ' Lady Mary Staunton, and if she can't, Lady Silvermere.' ' She is quite right,' said Mr. Harland. ' The woman is rapidly developing in this small person. There will be two Drawing rooms in May ; she had better go to the first one, if possible.' ' I'll tell you what we'll do,' I said. ' To morrow afternoon we'll drive over to the Hurst and see Lord Stiffton, and he will tell us whether his cousin or his daughter will be best ; he will know all about it.

Wasn't Lady Silvermere there last week, Arthur ? ' ' Yes,' said Arthur ; ' I met her one day driving.' Then I began swinging backwards and forwards in my chair, thinking of it all. I had suddenly become quite an important person. The world which had been so bright and happy, but so narrow that Mr. Harland was the only person I knew beyond the county almost, Avas suddenly widening out and becoming very big and attractive. I, TOO 25 They went on talking about different hotels, and all that kind of thing, and arranging that Mr. Harland was to take rooms for us from the first week in May. I hardly heard them. ' One place I am determined to go to,' I said, suddenly, ' is the Law Courts. I want to hear you speak.' ' You hear me speak a great deal more here than you would in the Law Courts,' Mr. Har land said, laughing, ' but there is rather a big case coming on in May some time, the biggest I have ever had, and if you ' ' Oh, I shall like that better than anything.