Esther Lovell. A life story

Front matter

■ I ■ ■ ■ ■ BY THE SAME AUTHOR. THE WHITE CROSS AND DOVE OF PEARLS A Biography of Light and Shade. Eighth Thou sand. Crown 8vo, cloth, Price 5s. LAURA LINWOOD; or, The Price of an Accomplishment. Fourth Edition. Crown 8vo, cloth gilt eiigss :- jprice 3s. 6d. I X7D-EG0 -LoNDON: I10DDER& STOBCHTON, 27, Paternoster Row A LIFE STORY. BY SARSON C. J. INGHAM, — - \c^ AUTHOR OF "THE WHITE CROSS AND DOVE OF PEARLS," " SELINA S STORY, " LAURA L1NWOOD," ETC. lib on : HODDER AND STOUGHTON, 27, PATERNOSTER ROW. MDCCCXC. Printed by Hazels, I! 'atson, &> Viiiey, Ld., London and Aylesbury. CONTENTS CHAP. PAGE I. A LITTLE MALADROITE ...... I II. MAKING FRIENDS WITHOUT CEREMONY ... 9 III. THE KEY TO MR. FAIRBAIRN'S GLOOM . . -19 IV. MATERNAL DIPLOMACY . . . . . . 31 V, BETWEEN THE TURNIP-FIELD AND THE FALLOW 41 VI.

A LETTER FROM POLAND . . ■ • 53 VII. A COTTAGE INTERIOR ... . . 5S VIII. BIRDS NOT OF A FEATHER . . . . .69 IX. THE TREE FALLS AS IT LEANED . . . - 79 X. TURNED OUT OF PARADISE . . . . .86 XI. SCENE ON AN EMIGRANT SHIP . . . -99 XII. THE RENEWAL OF HOPE . . . . . I07 XIII. A PLEASANT PARTY . . . - . . 114 XIV. AMONG THE LAUBHUTTEN . . . . . 120 XV. A LAMB NEWLY SHORN. . . . . .129 XVI. TALKED TO FOR HER GOOD . . . -134 XVII. OUT OF THE HOUSE OF BONDAGE. . ... 139 XVIII. PLAYING WITH EDGE-TOOLS ..... I48 CONTENTS. VI CHAP. PAGE XIX. REVENGE IS SWEET 157 XX. THE TIDE IN HER AFFAIRS . . . -165 XXI. INFLUENCES OF NATURE . . . . .176 XXII. THE LADY INSISTS ON THE SPURS . . 193 XXIII. ESTHER IN THE LIBRARY . . . 203 XXIV. SLOW REMORSE. . . . . . .22 1 " PLEASED TO PLAY THE THIEVES FOR WIVES " XXV. 227 XXVI.

THROUGH THE RED SEA ON FOOT . . . 233 xxvii. the Jewess's story ..... 242 xxvm. love's young dream ..... 254 XXIX. THE MOTHER SELF-REVEALED .... 263 XXX. A DIVIDED HEART ...... 269 XXXI. THE COURSE OF TRUE LOVE .... 284 XXXII. TAKEN TO TASK ...... 290 XXXIII. A FAMILY JAR ....... 299 XXXIV. HER INSUFFICIENCY ...... 306 XXXV. A POWERFUL ARGUMENT . . . . . 316 XXXVI. NOT ACCEPTING DELIVERANCE . . . -324 xxxvii. gone ........ 333 XXXVIII. GRAVE FOR A SCHOOLGIRL .... 336 XXXIX. "IN THE MIDST OF LIFE WE ARE IN DEATH". 348 XL. LED BY APPEARANCES ..... 353 XLI. A REMARKABLE FAMILY ..... 359 XLII. ARTIFICIAL FRIENDSHIPS NOT FORMED TO LAST. 378 XL1II. A DOE SHOWING FIGHT ..... 397 XLIV. ONE TENDER FAREWELL ..... CONTENTS. vii CHAP. PAGE XLV. FRIENDSHIP THAT DESERVES THE NAME 412 XLVI. HOPE DEFERRED . . . . . .419 XLVII.

Chapter I

A LITTLE MALADROITE. A hare-brained, sentimental trace Was strongly marked in her face, A wildly witty, rustic grace Shone full upon her ; Her eye, even turned on empty space Beamed keen with honour."' Robert Burns. " O ORRY to keep you waiting, my lord, but this customer »_3 is urgent." " No need of apology," replied his lordship, " I may as well wait as another ; and I am not urgent." " Your lordship is kind," was the reply, obsequiously spoken. A slight but not ill-natured curl of the lip testified to his lordship's appreciation of the tone, if not of the remark. Perhaps too much deference to his rank did not please him, or to assume a proud indifference to it was one of his small affectations. He retired from the counter and stood in a lounging attitude by the window, playing with his cane.

From his manner, life might not, as yet, have furnished him with any more earnest employment ; but, then, he was at an age when large allowance has to be made for Nature's tax upon the energies ; when man or woman is running up to the full stature, after the fashion of ill weeds. The impression generally taken of Lord Lisle, by persons unacquainted with him, was that he was young for his years ; an impression owing partly to the carelessness of his deport ment, partly to its frankness, but still more to the fact that the cast of his features — features such as always bespeak either race or genius — had matured too soon; so that, instead of being estimated according to his eighteen years, he was treated as a man of two or three-and-twenty. There was a weary look about the eyes, a jaded expression when the face was not lighted up, which might, to one who looked beneath the surface, suggest sedentary habits, study by the midnight taper, and all the other sins whereto intellectual and aspiring youth is supposed specially to be addicted.

The impeachment was no libel ; but it was not for tripos or wranglership, or for any academic distinction, that he con tended. His enthusiasm was Art. For her prizes he did not struggle, but his devotion to her was so intense as to be con suming. Art was the ruling passion of his life. Wealth, learning, power — all that his birthright conferred upon him — he would have sacrificed to her, more hungrily than Esau resigned his for Jacob's red pottage. And with as small credit to him, some people would have said. The Florentine chisel, the Raphaelite brush, were more desirable in his eyes than the crown of universal empire. A devotion so bordering on infatuation was to be regretted in one who might in the future be the representative of his shire ; on whom the cares and duties of his rank must, in a few years, devolve, and who ought one day to exert a widespread influence.

A somewhat dreamy observer of men and things was Lord Lisle ; but he observed with the eye of an artist. While he was still waiting a child entered the shop, and had, of course, to wait also. There was no apology to her for delay, as she stood patiently beside the counter. She was a singular-looking little being, and instantly arrested our artist's attention. She was poorly dressed ; but there was a certain grace about her which redeemed the meanness of her apparel. Her brown, curly hair fell in picturesque confusion over her face, and her blue innocent eyes looked coyly from it, like little speedwells from a forest bower of fern leaves. In her hand she held two mackerel, very insufficiently wrapped in A LITTLE MALADROITE. 3 brown paper. She could not, judging from her height, be more than ten years of age ; but the weird little face — albeit not prematurely old — would have looked thoughtful on a girl of fourteen.

Lord Lisle, after carefully considering her, came to the conclusion that she was, without exception, the most remarkable child he had seen in all his long experience. Being a disciple of Lavater, he wondered what traits of cha racter the finely-curved but prominent chin and the quick breathing nostril indicated. It did not escape him that, while he was studying her with so much interest, she was equally engrossed with some engravings and brightly-coloured prints which were laid upon the counter. " How soon the vulgar or the childish eye is caught with the brilliant in colour ! " thought Lord Lisle ; but she passed on from them to some beautiful steel engravings. She raised herself on tiptoe in her anxiety to see them ; and, at last, wholly forgetting herself, she took some of them in her hand.

An exclamation from the stationer brought the little trans gressor rudely to her senses. "Down with you, little girl! What are you thinking of — handling those beautiful pictures, when your hands must be strong of fish ? Well, I really thought you had known better ! " The child dropped the prints as if they had stung her. The colour rushed vividly into her face, and, for one moment, she looked up at her censor as if she were fain to speak but could find no words. Little need had she, however, of words — with a face that could express so much by a look ; — wounded delicacy, insulted self-respect, shame for her forgetfulness, and anger at the rebuke. The stationer — not an unkindly man — was taken aback, and said, more gently, — " Well, now, little madam, what are you wanting ? " " This month's ' Blackwood's,' " she faltered.

" I thought your father meant to drop it ? " " No, he will keep it on," she said, with a voice tremulous from the painful vibration of another string. The stationer handed it to her. She put down the money and passed out of the shop, as if sincerely glad to escape from the eyes that had witnessed her disgrace. Quick as thought Lord Lisle took up some of the prints, and, directing the stationer to fold them, as quickly followed her. He soon overtook her, for she was only creeping along at a snail's pace. He touched her on the shoulder. She turned her head, but, seeing who it was, her eyes dimmed with tears of mortification. They brightened, however, at his kind words. "Here, little one, is a small parcel for you. You like pictures, I think." A bright flush came into her face — an expression of wonder ing thanks.

He did not wait to hear what she would say; but his eyes followed her with a curious surprise, while character istic reflections were passing through his mind. " If form is spirit's robe," he thought, " what a Psyche dwells behind that face ! The tragic powers of a Siddons might lie latent there as truly as song in a nightingale's egg. What a changeful face ! What expression ! She will have a wide range of feelings when she grows older. How I wish I could paint the small thing as she looked just now ! If I had the genius of a Parrhasius, and as much iron in my composi tion, I might send for her, play upon her, tease her, and then transfer her appeal and scorn to the canvas. Poor child, she is to be pitied ! Such a nature in humble life must be a sorrowful possession. She will have as she grows up to get the iron mask for it, and put the padlock on.

It will be the target for a hundred arrows else." Being yet a minor, Lord Lisle realised at present but few of the splendid advantages conferred upon him through the right of entail. He had early been left fatherless ; and his luxuriant mind required more judicious training than it had received from his mother. She was not wanting in affection. She had the interest of her son at heart, but she failed to comprehend his character. Her love for him was not informed by one particle A LITTLE MALADROITE. 5 of sympathy ; so there was little wonder if it was only dutifully reciprocated — nothing more. There is a great deal of family love that rises no higher than instinct ; this was of the kind. Lady Arabella's pride in the talents of her son was qualified by the reflection that he was visionary and enthusiastic.

She had accepted it as a dogma that all visionary people were weak minded ; and to enthusiasm she had a delicate, high-bred aversion. Her ambition for him — ambition for his career at college, ambition for his popularity in his county — was doomed, as she thought, to disappointment, because his energies were directed into another channel — a channel as free to the son of the peasant as the prince. Most great sculptors and painters were, she believed, low-born. The nobility were scarcely sup posed to have leisure for the " toil divine." Far better did it become them to be its patrons. Altogether, the Lady Arabella was grievously disappointed in her only boy ; and, perhaps as he grew out of the period of childish illusion, he had an unacknowledged sense of disappointment in her ; for such things will be, and a worldly-minded woman she was, taken at her best ; religious when she thought religion in good form, and able to dispense with the profession that substituted the reality whenever it appeared to her old world and behind the times.

The youngest daughter of Lord Beauclerc Geoffrey Fitz- Portal, she boasted that through her veins coursed the proud blood of the Plantagenets. In her hopeful son's it might have lost both its pride and its fire, he heard the boast with so much indifference. Clievely Hall, where they resided, was a unique building. It was six stories high, and on each story there was a room less, till, reaching the sixth, there was only one. Consequently, the building was a spiral tower. This highest room was our hero's study, or studio. It was lighted from the top as well as from the sides. It had once been the nursery; but every childish association was removed, the trace of its former co-resident had vanished, and it now spoke only of Art. The narrow windows looked on a perfect English landscape ; hill and dale, wood and stream, the sylvan and the pastoral, blended in all the sweet witchery of nature, with that tender grace peculiar to our skies, which show us less of the sapphire than the pearl.

Through the crimson curtains fell a soft, dreamy light. The walls were hung with Ettys, Gainsboroughs, and paintings by Raphael, his " Madonna " and " Casket " being conspicuous. On the mantelpiece were bronze figures of Dante and Virgil ; and, not very artistically obtruded between these august personages, a phrenological cast. The cast, however, was there for convenience, and as being deemed essential to accurate delineation, especially in historic pieces. A Hebe and a Ganymede held the lamps, which were made in the shape of cups. Bookshelves there were, but curtains were drawn over them as if they were intruders. Truly this room might have been consecrated, not to one muse, but ambitiously to the nine ; for there was a flute on the table, where music-books, paints, crayons, and unfinished drawings made an elegant disorder.

The morning after the incident with which our story opens, Lord Lisle was considering which of his pieces he should finish before his return to his college, when a tap at the door, followed by a tattoo, announced a visitor ; but he was in a brown study, and therefore altogether unconscious of it. It was repeated — this time very impatiently — and a young lady entered and established herself at the table, as if aware that she was a privileged person, and was taking liberties accorded to no one else. " Alf, have you finished me up my drawings ? " " Drawings ! Oh, yes. Well, bring me them." " I brought you them yesterday, and put them down here, and you said you would touch them up for me ; but, as usual, you have forgotten. How provoking you are, Alf! Now I shall not get them framed in time and ready for aunt's birthday."

Alf did not appear very much disconcerted by this tirade, though he knew he deserved it. A LITTLE MALADROITE. 7 " Does a single day make so much difference, Clara ? " " Yes, but you, who are so given to day-dreaming, do not know the value of time, as I do, who am practical, and, besides, have lived a whole year, to say nothing of odd weeks, longer in the world. I am bound to forgive your faults on the score of youth and inexperience, and the forbearance that should belong to my melancholy advantage in age." " Thank you." And his eye again grew dreamy, while the beautiful fault-finder took up the crayons and busied herself with the slighted drawings. Looking up in a few minutes at her brother, a most amusing expression of self-gratulation spread over her face, while she said, with an air of mock resignation, — "After all, I'd rather be myself than you."

" I should think so. But why do you volunteer that piece of information ? " " Because I'd rather live on the earth all the days I have to live on it, and get into the spirit of what's passing, and mix up with all the life, before changing this one, such as it is, for a better, than I'd do as you do — live half-way betwixt heaven and earth, somewhere, no one knows where, in Cloudland. You are like the angel in Revelation, that was seen standing with one foot on the land and the other on the sea. An existence so divided is not to be desired. I don't think heaven will be the change to you when you get there that it will be to some of us." Lord Lisle laughed merrily. " Well, I must say that I appreciate the implied compliment, Clara. Unfortunately, however, I have to confess that " ' My words fly up, my thoughts remain below : Words without thoughts never to heaven go.' " " Very likely ; for I haven't a very high opinion of you, nor can I have while you do the things you ought not to do, and leave undone those things which ought to be done."

" Instance your drawings ; keep to your text, Clara." Her tone became more earnest. " I think, Alfred," she said, " you are not building well for the future. You are to be a landlord, and, it may be, to have a seat in the House ; and you shut yourself up here, and go rambling over the country taking sketches, when you ought to be going on with your college course, with the assistance of your dry-nurse, as you so irreverently call Mr. Chapman. And you ought to be riding, sometimes, amongst the tenantry, and winning golden opinions. They will know nothing of you but what they get to know through your steward or your land bailiff, and I suppose it is to these functionaries you will dele gate your responsibilities, and the redressing of all grievances. Positively, I think your life is a mistaken one, and that some fine morning you will wake up to think what a precious fool you have been !

" Strong as this rebuke was, it was prompted by a deep and a tender feeling. Lord Lisle put his hand on her shoulder. " My sister," he said, " vous ne comprenez pas quelques choses. However, you are wiser than I in most things, and it is a pity you should trouble yourself so much about me. You can't conquer my must with your ought, and the friction hurts you the most. I'm sorry. Nevertheless, I'll promise you I'll be good, and good in the way you would have me. I'll finish you up your drawings as the first step in a right direction. You don't deserve that I should, you little sham, for you haven't done half as much at them yourself as you might have done. Wouldn't you like a ride this morning ? If you wouldn't, I would. Let's have the horses brought round." A welcome suggestion always to Clara Lisle. Promising to be ready in half-an-hour, she went off to assume her riding habit ; he, to send the order to the groom.

Chapter II. Making Friends Without Ceremony

"Away from the dwellings of careworn men, The waters are sparkling in wood and glen ; Away from the chambers and dusky hearth, The young leaves are dancing in breezy mirth Their light stems thrill to the wild wood strains. And youth is abroad in my green domains." Felicia Hemans. LADY ARABELLA watched her son and daughter ride off together with feelings of pride, and well she might, for in a less partial light than the light of mother's eyes, they had "Grown in beauty side by side," and the strong contrast they presented to each other heightened their individual charms. Miss Lisle, as a horsewoman, was the admiration of the whole country round. This morning, as she rode by her brother's side, young and fresh as the spring, with no earthly care to depress her, her light laugh was borne upon the breeze, in perfect harmony with the joy around her.

" How cool and refreshing the morning air is," she said ; " it makes one wish one could always be young, so to enjoy it." " Yes," said Alfred ; " I sometimes think that immortal youth may not be the least happiness of heaven." " The very sense of being on such a morning is delightful. Oh, it is a jolly thing to live ! " " I always wake up most keenly to the sense of life when I am in London," replied Alfred ; " I like to watch the streams of people, to mix with the crowd, and to think how many are suffering and struggling, and how each may have a purpose hid in his heart that seems to be at war with his destiny. If only each did not, as a rule, mistake his place in the cosmos and get crushed into it by the agonising ascendency of what Goethe calls the Shall over his Will I Better than the burial place of kings is the thoroughfare of living men.

You feel as if life must be like a game at cards when you hear the lawyers at Westminster Hall, and a go-ahead, jostle-you-out-of-the-way march, when you watch the men upon 'Change. Then the shades of Boswell and Johnson saunter with you down Fleet Street, and if one wants to hear the forcefulness of the verna cular, and can dispense with the beauty, Billingsgate and the wharves are worth visiting. Do not be horrified, Miss Lisle ! " " Whatever should you know of such horrid places, Alfred ? Billingsgate, indeed ! That's where they sell fish, isn't it ? A delicate place to recreate. I congratulate you on your taste, Lord Lisle." " Because I am alien to no class ? Different phases of human life interest me ; and why not ? I shall have all the richer bank to draw on in the future." " You are differently constituted to me, then.

I do not like the town. I was heartily glad when my season there was over, and my only anxiety now is dread of the next. The country for me ! The long ride over the moors, with the pleasure of teaching the poor people's children, absolved from its toils, just as a salve to my conscience, which does now and then whisper : ' Clara Lisle, you ought to find something to do ; and if you can't find anything, make it.' I was quite an excep tion to the young ladies I met with in town, and always afraid I was committing myself. The drawing-room was an incubus which kept me from sleeping for three mortal nights, though it was nothing so terrible, after all. "I was wondering, this morning," she continued, "how long this happy, bird-like existence of mine could go on. They say that when sorrows come they come like swallows, and that no one goes scot-free.

I wonder how and when they will come to me ? An agreeable speculation, isn't it ? " " When you first come under the notice of the little god Cupid, Clara." She laughed — a merry, ringing laugh " I think I am Cupid proof ; for I have never yet been conscious even ofa preference." " If you can't choose for yourself, why don't you let mamma choose for you ? " There was a lurking irony in this speech. " Beautiful ! Why, I would as soon put into a matrimonial register ; for then I might get a prize. Mamma thinks of rank, and she likes nobility to have its patent. Her ambition for me begins with the red hand of the baronet. She stands to take it on the lowest rung of the ladder, but her eyes look higher." "You are always irritating and disappointing her, Clara; but I don't see how you can help it.

We are a precious pair, you and I, and cause each a great deal of disappointment in our own way." At that moment two gentlemen passed, brought suddenly in sight by a turn in the road ; they also were mounted, and were rather distinguished looking, though evidently the worse for travelling. Lord Lisle surmised that they were on an eques trian tour, for strangers of their appearance were rare in that neighbourhood, therefore a little curiosity respecting them was pardonable. The riders, whoever they were, indulged in the like privilege of commenting on Lord Lisle and his sister. " What a lovely girl ! " said one. "Yes ; and what an uncommonly interesting young man." " I wonder who they are ? " " Some squire's children, no doubt. Beauty is not un common in such neighbourhoods. Fresh air and exercise, freedom from care and wholesome living, give to the country people a bloom and a freshness not to be met with in town."

" But this lady is no rustic; she has a really aristocratic air." "So has her brother— assuming that he is her brother. But that does not say much. He has, perhaps, been sent to Eton or to Harrow ; his sister has been at a first-class school, and they have been surrounded with the elegancies of life and with affluence at home. There are fine specimens to be found among the daughters of country gentlemen, and that they are healthful is not their least charm. All the better, too, for them, mentally ; though often, it must be confessed, their minds are of a very mediocre order, and their views con tracted." " Bah ! Who cares for intellect and information in a woman ? Granted she is sensible and affectionate, fairly accomplished, let the rest go. What I like is style and beauty ; and that style, so far as I could judge from partial observation, pleases me.

No exotic, but a hardy plant ; no weakly, clinging girl-sapling, but a thriving, vigorous, human tree." " I should pity the girl-sapling that was confided to you, St. Johns." " You need not. I am not so hard as you think ; but I had sooner be mated with a shrew, if it was only for the fun of taming her." Another turn of the road brought them in view of Clievely Hall. " I wonder to whom that place belongs?" said St. Johns. As if to relieve his curiosity, a young country girl at that moment appeared on the road. St. Johns reined in his horse and accosted her. " Good morning ! " he said. " Good morning to you, sir ! " And she dropped him a curtsey in her perpendicular country fashion. " Can you tell me to whom that place belongs ? " " That is Clievely Hall, sir, and Lady Arabella Lisle lives there with her son, Lord Lisle, and the young lady.

The Dowager Lady Lisle lives on that place over there, sir. It's called the Fountains, you can see it through the trees. It was his father's death before his uncle's death that made Lord Lisle heir." " What a pretty face you've got, and how sensibly you talk. Have those pretty black eyes of yours seen any gipsies in the neighbourhood to-day ? " " No, sir ; but they are not far to seek — the mischiefs ! " " Here is a shilling to go and have your fortune told. I hope they will promise you a husband handsome and rich, six feet high in his shoes and a little over." " What do you say, Fairbairn, to giving Clievely Hall a call ? If Lord Lisle is at home we may be glad to make his acquaintance. He may be a nice fellow, though he is only a tender twig." " As you like. I can do audacious things with you to keep me in countenance."

When Lord and Miss Lisle reached home they were sur prised to learn that there was company to dinner, and conjec tured at once that they were the same gentlemen they had passed on the road. When Lady Arabella introduced them to Sir Hugh St. Johns and Mr. Fairbairn they looked a little conscious, and Sir Hugh said, — " We passed you, I think, on the road ? " Miss Lisle quickly replied in the affirmative, while her brother made them welcome to Clievely Hall, and regretted that he had not returned home earlier. He knew what was bounden on him, but discharged the obligation in a nervous, boyish fashion, that was very young, and in painful contrast with his sister's easy self-possession. " You have been gone a long time, my love," said Lady Arabella to her daughter. " It is nearly six o'clock."

"We called to see aunt, and she insisted on our remaining to luncheon. She said she had begun to feel neglected." At dinner Clara sat opposite to Sir Hugh St. Johns, and was very much the object of his quiet scrutiny; but, for tunately, not being over-burdened with self-consciousness, she was scarcely aware of it. It was natural their eyes should meet. She was a pretty object for the eye to rest upon, with her delicate colour brightened by the morning's exercise, her blue eyes sparkling with enjoyment, and her light hair waving over her fair brow. A pale-blue dress, made low with a simple bertha of white nett, became her well. Though the parties thus met at dinner were strangers before that evening, they soon fell into an easy flow of conversation and talked without restraint. The conversation turned mostly on the country and the agricultural improvements going on.