Cousin Jim: a sepia sketch

Front matter

NEW NOVELS AT ALL THE LIBRARIES. ALL IN ALL. By CORINNA BRUCE. 1 vol. 6s. SWORN ALLIES. By M. E. LE OLERC, Author of ' Mistress Beatrice Cope,' 'Robert Carroll,' &c. 1 vol. 6s. LIFE AGAIN-LOVE AGAIN. By V. MUNRO FERGUSON, Author or -Betsy,' ' Music hath Charms,' &c. 1 voL 6s. THE SOUND OF A VOICE. By LINDA GARDINER, Author of 'His Heritage.' 1vol. 6s. THE WOOING OF A FAIRY. By GERTRUDE WARDEN, Author of ' The Sentimental Sex.' 1 vol. 6s. AN AUSTRALIAN DUCHESS. By AMYOT SAGON, Author of ' A Fair Palmist,' &c 1 vol. 6s. LONDON f HURST & BLACKETT, LIMITED. A SEPIA SKETCH BY L. HIGGIN AUTHOR OF ' A C&RNISH MAID.' There is no art to find the mind's construction in the face. Macbeth. IN ONE VOLUME. LONDON : HURST AND BLACKETT, LIMITED, 13, GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET. 1897. All Rights Reserved.

Chapter I. The Sisters

' There's father !' ' Oh, Beryl ! Where ?' ' Coming round the corner by the " Sir Isaac Newton." ' . 'Not out of it?' 'No ! you know he never comes out of a public-house, or goes into one, for that matter, where we can see him.' 'Beryl — is he . . . is he ?' ' No, he is not, Rachel. Let me see,' looking at her watch, ' it is only just four p.m. : he is in his usual four p.m. condition, — almost, one might say, sober.' B ' Oh, Beryl. How can you speak so of father?' ' Well, we did not select him ourselves, you know, did we ? He would have been quite different if we had. If you, for instance, had had the choosing of your own father, I know exactly what he would have been like. He would have been tall and thin, — father is certainly not thin, except about the legs, — very refined looking, and he would have worn a squash felt hat — no, I think a hard wide-brimmed felt, with a cord and tassels round it, and not exactly petticoats, but that petticoaty kind of garment your pet vicar wears ; eh, Rachel?' ' Tell me, dear, what is father doing ? is he coming here ?' ' Zigzagging along, as usual.

Now he is stopping at the tobacconist's. I do believe he is going in ! No, he has thought better of it : he remembers that he is within sisht of these windows, and it would indicate that he has money in his pocket. He is making straight for here to let us know that he is absolutely without means of existence. The street door is open , I know, I saw the " back kitchen " going out for the milk, so our beloved parent will not have to ring the " second floor front," but will come straight up, or as straight at least as his afternoon condition will allow. I wonder if there is anything pawnable in sight,' — looking round the room with a swift sweeping gaze. ' Faugh ! what an existence ! Here he comes. I shall bolt !' ' Oh, Beryl darling, do not go ! You know father does not stay so long when you are here, and ' The girl laughed — not a pleasant laugh, nor a merry one. ' All right, Rachel, I will prepare for war. ' Not that exactly, but — The door was pushed open at this moment, and Mr. Adolphus Wendal-Fane, late of H.M.'s 169th Foot, entered the room. ' You here, Beryl !' he exclaimed, as he crossed the room to implant a moist caress b on his eldest daughter. ' I thought you were engaged in that delightful employ ment of yours till six p.m.' ' We are stock-taking at the coal-yard to-day,' she replied, ' and my services are not required until to-morrow, otherwise I should have been at the receipt of custom as usual.

Charming place !' Beryl never lost an opportunity of re ferring to the coal-yard — where she occupied the post of cashier — before her father. She knew it irritated him. ' I wish to goodness you would get something more respectable to do,' he replied, in an aggrieved voice. ' It is perfectly respectable,' Beryl answered, ' not what you might call refined exactly, but good enough, I. think, for your daughter under present circumstances.' Rachel interposed, to prevent open war. '- Sit down, father, you are out of breath with those high stairs. Beryl hates the work as much as you do, but she does it bravely, all the same. We shall hear of something better soon, I hope.' ' I devoutly hope so,' he answered, taking off his hat and eyeing it ruefully. ' Rachel will like to think you are de vout,' remarked Beryl, casually. ' I wish she had brought you up not to be impertinent,' he replied. ' Ah ! that is my little way, we all of us have our idiosyncrasies.

Suppose we come to the point, father, we both have to go out shortly, and we may as well know to what we are indebted for( this visit ; in short, not to waste words, what do you want now ?' ' Beryl dear!' remonstrated Rachel. ' It's no use remonstrating with her now,' said Mr. Fane, in an irritable voice. ' You had the bringing of her up, and a nice mess you have made of it. Flippant and insolent, and without any natural feelings. If her poor mother had lived, everything would have been different.' The colour rushed over Rachel's sen sitive face, and tears sprang to her eyes. ' Everything ?' Was she to blame for the ruin which had overtaken them, for the downward drift of the miserable specimen of humanity before her ? Perhaps it would have been different ; and yet she remem bered only too well that her mother had died broken-hearted, leaving her, when scarcely more than a child, to continue the struggle which had been too much for herself. ' You shall not blame Rachel,' exclaimed Beryl, coming over from the window, and sitting on the edge of the table near her. ' Father, you who can live on her as you do ; can take the money you spend in all kinds of discreditable ways, from a blind woman !

If I were Rachel, or could influence her, you should never have an other penny. She might not be blind now if she had had ordinary care and comfort at the beginning; you know that ! I have heard you drivel over it before now, when you were in one of your weeping humours. She has slaved for you and for me, in spite of her misfortune, all these years. No, you shall not stop me, Rachel, I mean to have my say. It is too late for him to do anything,' looking with unutterable contempt on the deplorable remnant of a gentleman before her, ' but he can keep out of our way, and not disgrace us by coming here in that state.' ' I wish I were dead,' he said, ' there is not much to live for when one's own children flout one, and turn their father from their door. ' I wish you were,' replied Beryl, coolly and deliberately. ' Oh, do hush,' said Rachel, putting out her hand to touch her father : to her he was always at least the man her mother had loved. ' Beryl's life is very hard and uncongenial, it makes her bitter sometimes, but she does not mean it.

We are glad — we should always be glad for you to come here, father, if ' she hesitated. ' Ah, yes, if I came in a carriage and pair, and brought you handsome presents, instead of coming an absolutely penniless, broken man, not knowing where to get the next meal. I came to-day, however, to tell you that old Margery Fane is going off the hook. She has lasted an immense time ! I thought she would have died ten years ago. People with incurable com plaints always do linger in a surprising manner — but I saw a man from Old borough yesterday, and he tells me she is going at last ; the doctors say she cannot last many weeks. I was thinking, Rachel, if you had not better go down and see her — offer to be with her, you know — it would only be kind and — and — usual. I am nearly sure she must have left you girls something.

She always behaved very badly to me, but she liked Mary, she always liked your mother. She is quite dotty. I hear; you could get round her easily.' ' I cannot do that, father,' Rachel said, very gently. ' The very last time I saw Aunt Margery, she told me she could never do anything for me — for any of us again.' ' She would have done if you had thrown father over,' exclaimed Beryl ; ' she said if you insisted going on helping him to live in idleness, she would do no more for us — for you or me.' ' But why cannot you be sensible and go down now, and try and make it up ? it might not be too late. Tell her I am quite out of the way ; you can say I am dead if you like, d'ye see?' 'No, father, certainly not,' said Rachel. ' I did what I thought right then, and should never dream of trying to influence her now, when as you say her intellect is weakened.' ' That is so like you women !

The most pig-headed unpractical creatures ! I call it downright wicked of you. You know you might be able to provide for us all quite comfortably ; but your absurd and obnoxious pride steps in, and you prefer to sacrifice your poor old starving father, and leave your young sister to work among a lot of coal-heavers, to abating a jot of your own false pride.' Mr. Fane had raised his voice in his eagerness, and none of them had noticed a knock at the door. 'May I come in?' said a gentlemanly voice at this stage of the discussion, and much to Rachel's relief the vicar entered the room.

Chapter II. Tue Drift Of The Derelict

The Reverend Algernon Vernon, vicar of St. Asaph's, Camden Town, who had entered so unexpectedly on this little domestic scene, was, as Beryl had described him, tall and thin, of an eminently refined type of face, and a manner born of generations of gentle culture. He had passed his life, until a year ago, in remote country parishes, where, however, he had never been able to get any real hold on his people — he was cast altogether in too fine a mould for the bucolic mind : his sermons were of the gently meditative class, anxiously questioning his own probably blameless conscience for sins of a remote description : savouring rather of possibilities not attained or high ideals not perfectly reached, he failed to hit. the grosser failings of a class who, with many simple virtues, possessed some extremely pronounced and tangible sins, which they went on committing quite comfortably under his nose, undisturbed by the gentle lessons in a high moralitj^ quite beyond their comprehension, to which a certain number of them listened on Sundays.

His failure to reach his people depressed him, while he vearned for intellectual companionship, and the society of people who thought of something besides potatoes and cabbages and the probable length of the straw. Though he would have gone to the stake rather than own it, the society of his fellow-clergy palled on him ; the interests of their troubles with their churchwardens, the dangerous sinking of their church towers, and the date to which their registers went back, failed to satisfy him as conversation, and there were practically no other topics — or at least these were al ways returned to in the long run — so he had made the plunge longed for and yet dreaded, and had exchanged the vicarage of Oldborough for that of St. Asaph's. with a brother who suffered from a large familv and a delicate wife.

He had met the Fanes at the house of the old lady who was under discussion as he er-tered — Miss Mars-ervFane.an aunt of the gentleman still known as ' Captain " Fane to those who were not acquainted with the circumstances under which he left the army — and had lost no time in looking them up when he found they were living in his parish. From Miss Fane, who was what is generally known as a ' character," he had learned a little of their history. How they had gone on sinking lower and more hope lesslv in the social scale, dragged on by the drift of the derelict their father. How Rachel, left to continue the hopeless struff<rle which had killed her mother, and □ n to bring up Beryl, placed in her arms as a dying legacy by the poor woman in her last sad days, had fought courageously, and with the never-dying hope of youth, against overwhelming disaster, putting aside many a chance for her own escape, rather than break the solemn promise she had made never to desert her father, nor leave Beryl to his care alone, until at last, worn out by over-exertion and anxiety, a disease of the eyes had developed itself rapidly, and she had become hopelessly blind, her large dark eyes, which had al ways been her chief beauty, remaining uninjured in appearance, though the com plete failure of nerve power made them for ever useless.

Latterly, since things had gone from bad to worse, old Miss Fane had tried to get the vicar to use his influence in represent ing to Rachel that her duty to her young sister required her to cease, at any rate, from living in the same house as her disreputable parent, and, in fact, an arrange ment had been made by which she made over to Captain Fane entirely the small income — about forty pounds a year — which she possessed in her own right, and had removed to the cheap lodgings in Camden Town, where she eked out a sort of existence by acting as organist at St. Asaph's church, training the choir boys, and by giving cheap music lessons to the daughters of the neighbouring trades people ; filling up her spare time by knit ting for a city warehouse. Miss Margery Fane had given valuable assistance, at the time when Rachel's eye sight first became hopelessly affected, by iindertaking to pay for Beryl's education: and the girl had taken such advantage of her opportunities, that she was well equip ped for earning her own living — albeit it was a thing which she had very small intention of doing.

Provoked beyond measure at Rachel for making; over her income to her father. Miss Fane had finally cut off all supplies. and declared she would do no more for the sisters. As a result of answering an advertisement, Beryl had obtained a situation, as we have seen, in a coal-mer chant's office, or rather yard, where she sat in a stuffy little wooden box, and kept account of the trolly-men and their sales, as well as a good deal of the other book keeping of the firm. Beryl found a kind of actual satisfaction in this employment, its very incongruous ness amused her, and it was always a weapon ready to hurl at her father, who, when he was quite sober, winced at the idea of his girl in such surroundings, from a surviving remnant of gentlemanly feeling, and when he was in what Beryl called his ' four p.m. condition ' wanted always to go and knock down that ' beastly coal heaver.' Later in the day he was gener ally oblivious of all that concerned his daughters, unless it was to wonder vague ly how he could get any money out of them to-morrow.

For the rest, the work in the grimy shed in the coal-yard was loathsome to her, but it gave her a never-ending ground for pitying herself, and exciting pity in others. She had decorated her little box with plants and pretty cur tains, which were so spotless that one be gan to think coal-dust must be quite clean after all, and she herself was always the picture of spotless daintiness. The arrival of Mr. Vernon was the signal for ' Captain ' Fane's somewhat hur ried departure, and Beryl, who, for reasons of her own, preferred a tetn-a-tete with the vicar, if anything, made excuse of an en gagement with a friend, and went out soon after. ' How pretty she is !' exclaimed the vicar, when she had gone off with a graceful little apology, giving the impression that it was a real grief to her to have to leave while he was there. ' It frets me more than I can say to think of her working all day in that dreadful coal-yard.' ' Poor Beryl!' said her sister, ' she feels her position terribly ; but. one never hears a word of complaint.

She is so good and brave, but I know she dislikes the work thoroughly ; how could it be otherwise ? c I would like her to give it up, but we can not do without her pay, miserable as it is.' ' Dear Miss Fane, you will not think me impertinent if I ask what Moore and Wells are giving her now ?' ' Only eighteen shillings a week,' replied Rachel. ' I am sure she is worth much more than that ; they promised her a rise last Christmas, but it has never come off.' The vicar puckered his brow a little and looked, as he felt, puzzled. He had only that morning been talking to Mr. Moore about her, and that gentleman had said, ' You see, we give Miss Fane twenty eight shillings a week now. I don't say she is not worth it. We should have to give a man two pounds to do her Avork, and he would feather his own nest beside, but, what with strikes and competition the business cannot afford it, sir, and we cannot think of another rise.' ' I was speaking to Lady Morden about her to-day,' he continued, aloud. ' She is wonderfully interested in your sister.

She has noticed her being so regular an attend ant at the early celebrations.' ' Yes, it is such a comfort to me that Beryl has taken so seriously to religious duties — they will help her so much. She ne\Ter speaks much about it. She is naturally reticent, and so sensitive, dear child ; but there could be no more seA^ere test of her sincerity that these serATces. She is not an early riser.' 'Lady Morden has promised me to look out for something more suitable for her. I said she was an excellent linguist.' ' Then she is so good about going to the people's recreation classes in the eATenings, tired as she must be. She goes all the Avay to Whitechapel at least twice a week. She says it refreshes her ; but I think the journey very fatiguing after her office hours.' Mr. Vernon raised his eyebrows in slight surprise once more. ' Why go so far ?

I think I could find her Avork to do of that kind in St. Asaph's.' Then he turned the conversation to c bocks and subjects Avhich he knew inter ested the blind Avoman, perhaps all the more because she Avas dependent on others for all she could know of them. ' Oh, if only I could think that the in terest Mr. Vernon takes in my little Beryl Avould lead to something wanner,' thought Rachel, after the vicar had taken his departure, ' hoAv happy it would make me. She is ahvays sweet Avith him, and he is certainly A'ery much taken Avith her. Sometimes when he is giving me a description of how the little sister I have not seen for so many years looks in some neAV costume, he seems to linger over it al most loA'ingly. My poor little Beryl ! her life is very hard. And I can neA'er forget that it is partly my fault. If avc could only know for certain always what is right, and do it. But life is so difficult.'

Chapter III. Recreations For The People

Meanwhile Beryl, Avho had returned to her room to put one or two finishing touches to her toilette after saying ' good bye ' to the vicar, Avas Avalking slowly to wards the exhibition at Earl's Court. She smiled to herself quietly as she saw a man, no longer in his first youth, impatiently consulting his Avatch a few paces from the entrance, after going forward eagerly to scan the visitors alighting from an omnibus which had just deposited the greater portion of its freight opposite the exhibition. At that moment he looked up, and catching sight of her came forward. ' Taking it as coolly as if you were half an hour before the time instead of having kept me here on tenter-hooks for more than an hour.' 'Why tenter-hooks?' she said. 'You kneAV I was coming.' ' I knew you had said you Avere coming,' he replied, ' Avhich is quite a different thing.' ' Poor boy,' she said ; ' AAras it impatient, then ?

So much the greater the pleasure when it comes. But if you are going to be cross and disagreeable, I Avill hail that omnibus and return to the bosom of my afflicted family.' ' Pax,' he said, ' I Avill forgive you this time, I will go and order dinner, and then it Avill be ready for us when Ave have had a stroll round. I am hungry; and a hungry man is nothing more nor less than a beast, you know.' Beryl Avaited for him in a pretty attitude Avhile he went and made arrangements for Avhat he called a snug little table, Avhere they could hear the band pleasantly, and see the people Avithout being seen, and then they strolled round the gardens for half an hour. ' What sort of a tarradiddle have you told to-day about your engagement?' he asked. ' I never tell tarradiddles,' said Beryl, ' it is vulgar and dangerous, and besides, my respected father does it for us all.

It is unnecessary to have more than one romancer in the family.' ' But I thought you said your sister believes you to be someAvhere at the East- End recreating the people.' ' I am not ansAverable for her beliefs,' she ansAvered, Avith much coolness. ' I merely told her once that there were recreation classes for the public at White chapel, and that good people Avent all that way to assist at them. When I said I Avas going to help to amuse the Avorking people in an evening, I meant myself, of course ; the rest is all her imagination. I never take the trouble to set people right, Avhy should I ? 1 am recreating one of the Avorking class here, am I not ?' ' Assuredly you are,' he replied, laughing. ' Suppose you Avere to meet the vicar here?' ' But I shall not. I knoAv all his evening engagements at St. Asaph's, and you may be A'ery sure I don't come here on the onlj day of the week he can get aAvay." ' You are a pretty cute little 'possum,' he said, ' and you look so deliciously innocent with it all.' Beryl looked up at him Avith a curious expression that made James Beaumont feel both uncomfortable and on his guard.

It was a look that took his measure in a remarkable manner for a girl. ' Let us go and haA'e dinner iioav,' he said, ' it must be ready. I flatter myself that I have ordered a very perfect little meal, colonial as I am, and as you are never tired of reminding me.' ' I like colonials,' she replied, ' and I like your little dinners, as you know, immensely. I think of them all next day in the coal-shed.' ' Poor little girl,' looking doAvn at the dainty figure at his side. ' 1 hate to think of girls working at all — it should not be allowed, but that place of yours is too horrible.' Beryl was not by any means in the habit of telling her admirers, of whom she had had a good many, the true history of her home and her AA-ay of living ; but Mr. Beaumont, perhaps because he was so much older than herself, had had all the story of her blind sister, their wretched father, and of the squalid, miserable lodgings on the ' second floor front ' in Camden Town.

She AA-as filled with pity for herself, and Avhen she Avas among this pleasure-seeking crowd, looking no whit less dainty — on the ten shillings a week Avhich did not find its way into the house keeping purse — than any of the other girls, it seemed to her simply horrible that she was to go back in the morning to the dust, and dirt, and the horrible books in the coal-yard. Nor was her companion's pity for her any less, though he sometimes thought of the blind sister knitting in the comfortless lodgings. It Avas, he told himself, pity for her hard life that made him go on giving her these little dinners, the visits to the theatres, and trips to Richmond. But he had been feeling A'ery uncomfortable about them lately ; there AA'as a recklessness about Beryl Avhich at first had made it seem a fair enough game, but latterly he had come to think a little differently about her, and about the Avisdom, not to say honour, of going on Avith these particular recreations.

To tell the truth, Beryl herself was get ting dissatisfied. The affair did not make the progress she had intended. She was beginning to feel vaguely that though she had the temporary power Avhich any at tractive Avoman has over a man, Avhen she chooses to use it, she Avas no nearer bind ing James Beaumont as a victim to her car than she Avas the first night she met him — further, in fact. She had no real hold over him, and if she Avere to fling aAvay in a pet and refuse to meet him any more, she had a horrible suspicion that he would shrug his shoulders, and look out for some one else. He had understood, as she meant him to do, that she intended no Aulgar intrigue ; but he seemed quite con tent to go on playing the benevolent pro vider. Avithout getting any nearer to the condition to which Bervl looked forward, when she should be able to make her own terms.

The ' Entertainments for the People,' as they had come to call them, were Aery pleasant, no doubt, but was she not rather Avasting time ? That was the question run ning in Beryl's head, and the meaning of the look which had given Beaumont a distinct shock. Before the end of the evening, accident had precipitated the un derstanding which both in different ways felt to be needful. It was after dinner a good while, and they had been sitting under the trees for some time, Avatching the illuminated foun tain and criticising the promenaders, when Beaumont suggested that they themselves should ' have a stretch.' They had not taken many turns, Avhen just under one of the electric lights near the band kiosk, a young girl stopped suddenly in front of them, exclaiming, ' Why, Beryl ! you here !' ' Why not ?' she replied ; and then, see ing the other glance toward her companion, Beryl remarked, A\'ith an air of perfect com posure, ' It is not very often that I do get a treat, is it?

This is Mr. Beaumont, the Australian cousin you haATe often heard Rachel speak of: Miss Heseltine-Fane, Mr. Beaumont.' To say that the latter fairly gasped with astonishment was scarcely to describe his feelings. Beryl, AA'ithout knoAving it, had quite accurately described the true state of affairs, only how Rachel could ever have spoken of him, he could not imagine. The tAvo girls exchanged a feAV common place remarks, spoke of seeing each other soon, and then Miss Heseltine-Fane joined the two old ladies Avhom she had left when she met Beryl. ' There !' said the latter, Avhen she had lost sight of them, ' perhaps noAV you Avill come and sit Avhere Ave are not so horribly visible to the naked eye. That is just the most respectable and strait-laced of all my cousins. Thank heaven she goes back to Oldborough to-morroAV — is " so sorry she cannot see dear Rachel again," or I do not know how I could have got out of the scrape.

It Avas rather neat, don't you think? introducing you as "our" Aus tralian cousin. " of Avhom Rachel so often speaks." Eirene looked uncommonly puzzled, as well she might, but it saved the situation.' 4 Then you did not knoAv that I am really your Australian cousin?' he asked. ' You !' replied Beryl. ' What on earth do you mean ?' ' Just Avhat I say. Your father's father and mine were brothers. I found it out the day you told me his name, and all about him.' ' Hoav do you come to be Beaumont, then?' ' Oh ! it is a long story — I changed my name. People often do in the Colonies,' he said. Beryl remained quite silent, not being able to make up her mind whether this was a development to be desired or not. For the moment she did not like it. 1 Are you stuffing me, or do you mean it ?' she asked, after they had settled themselves in a dark corner of the terrace, where once more they could see Avithout being seen. ' I mean it, really.' 'Then why keep it secret?' she asked. 1 That is a difficult question to answer.