Bolingbroke's Folly

Chapter I. The Heiress

fHIS letter for me?" and the speaker, a girl about nineteen, took up the large official-looking packet, and turned it over curiously. "I should open it, my dear," suggested a sedate looking lady, who sat at the opposite side of the breakfast table, and who also felt a little curious as to the contents of her niece's letter. The girl broke the seal and opened the ponderous blue sheet of paper, but after scanning a few lines of the crabbed writing, she handed it across the table to her aunt. " Uncle Felix is dead ; I can make that out, but whac the rest means I don't know. Poor Uncle Felix ! I wish we had known more about him, so that I could have been properly sorry. It does seem hard to have only one uncle in the world, and he almost a stranger." The elder lady was diligently reading the letter, and paid no attention to these remarks.

As she finished she care- BOLINGBROKE'S FOLL Y. 8 fully removed her gold-framed eye-glasses, and looking earnestly at her niece, she said — " Rosa, you are your uncle's heiress. Mr. Bolingbroke has left you all his property." " Oh, aunt ! and he would never let me go and see him," exclaimed the girl, the tears welling up to her eyes as she spoke. The elder lady looked surprised. " One would think your uncle had wronged you in leaving you this property," she exclaimed, a little tartly. " No, aunt ; but he might have sent to us while he was ill. He was dear papa's only brother, and I think — " " Now, Rosa, you must have your breakfast at once, or the lawyer will be here before we have finished," inter rupted her aunt. " He says he will call and ascertain your wishes about the funeral arrangements on his way to the City this morning, so there is no time to lose in vapouring over the whims of such an odd man as Mr. Felix Bolingbroke."

Miss Harker was a thoroughly practical lady, and had no patience with " vapouring '' of any kind. She had under taken the care of her orphan niece, on the death of her sister, and intended to bring her up on a plan she had laid down for the purpose. But nature was a little too strong for Miss Harker, and Rosa refused to be drilled, and squared, and stretched to the pattern laid down by her aunt ; and the lady sighed as she thought how much more power Rosa would now have to carry out ideas that, to the elder lady were most shocking. Young ladies, like little children " should be seen and not heard," and scarcely think for themselves beyond what their elders dictated. This was Miss Harker's belief, but she never could make Rosa adopt or practise it. As soon as the lawyer was gone there was a battle between aunt and niece.

" Well, my dear, have you settled anything with Williams?" asked the elder lady. THE HEIRESS. 9 "No, aunt ; only that I shall go down to Hayfield as soon I can get a black dress." " After the funeral ? " " No, aunt ; I shall go at once — that is, to-morrow, if I can, for I want to see Uncle Felix before he is laid in the grave." "Rosa, it is most improper — who ever heard of such a thing ? People will say you are in such a hurry to take possession of your new property that you cannot wait until the late owner is carried out of the house." The girl looked disconcerted for a moment, but she said after a pause — " I can't help people's mistakes, auntie ; but I know I should not like uncle to be carried out of the house without someone belonging to him being near, and so I told Mr. Williams I will be ready to go down with him to-morrow morning."

Miss Harker held up her hands in dismay. " Whatever will people say when they hear of it ? " she exclaimed. " Don't think about it, and then it need not trouble us, auntie," said Rosa, calmly, and she went upstairs to prepare for her walk to the linendraper's. Much as Miss Harker disapproved of her niece's mode of procedure, she would not let her go to Hayfield alone with the lawyer, and so when he called the next morning he found the two ladies waiting for him. He had arranged that a first-class carriage should be reserved for their use, and on the way down he told them a little more about the Hayfield property. " Nearly all the village stands upon the estate, but beyond being picturesque in the distance, I cannot say much for it" explained the lawyer. " You see, Mr Bolingbroke was a man of hobbies, and he cared for nothing outside of them.

Stones and shells he collected and housed, but he has allowed the old mansion to drop into decay, so you must be prepared for things being a little in disorder on your arrival." BOLINGBROKE'S FOIL Y. 10 After leaving the railway there was a drive of four miles before Hayfield was reached, but there was a carriage in readiness, and their way lay through deep, bowery lanes, with hedgerows of hawthorn and wild rose just bursting into bloom. The deep cart-ruts proclaimed them as almost impassable in winter, or during wet weather ; but just now, in the first flush of their summer beauty, a fairer scene could scarcely be imagined, and Rosa's first peep at her new territory, the village of Hayfield, sent her into raptures. She saw it from the crest of a hill, and there it lay embow ered in woods and green pastures, the thatched roofs of the cottages, with their patches of green houseleek and yellow stonecrop shining up from the dim-coloured thatch, and making it look, in the distance, an ideal English village.

But, alas ! a nearer view dispelled a good deal of the illusion, for broken fences, tumble-down gates, and pigs grubbing among the rubbish-heaps that Rosa expected to find smiling garden grounds, made the girl almost wish that the road did not lay through the village. The sight of the people, too, was not cheering. Dull-looking, slatternly women came to the cottage doors at the sound of the carriage-wheels, and called to the children sitting in the dusty road to get out of the way ; and a few old men, bowed with rheumatism, and leaning on sticks, came hob bling forward to look at the unwonted sight ; but the dead stagnation of the whole place struck a chill to Rosa's heart ; and she almost shivered as they passed the horse-pond and left the village behind. The gates of her own domain were reached soon after, and they turned into the grass-grown drive that brought them to the front of a solidly-built mansion, whose mullioned windows looked as lifeless as the village itself.

Lichen and moss had begun to weave fantastic tracery over the stone work of the house in many places, giving it a weather-worn and dilapidated appearance, that was anything but reassuring. An old man and his wife, with an untidy-looking girl HIE HEIRESS. 11 seemed to be all the servants the house contained. They bowed and bobbed to Rosa and Miss Harker, when the lawyer introduced these ladies ; and then the old house keeper hobbled forward to conduct her new mistress to the best bedrooms, with many apologies for not having things in better order. " Master, he do think of nothing but the little bits of stone and such rubbish as he keeps in his own room, and so the rest of the house was just left to itself for years and years," said the old woman complainingly. " Was my uncle ill long ? '' asked Rosa, when the old woman had thrown open the door of the best bed-chamber.

" Oh no, ma'am, he just complained of a cold the day before, but he was busy among his stones and shells, trying to get 'em in order, he said." Meanwhile, Miss Harker was talking to the lawyer down stairs. "It is impossible that my niece can live here," she exclaimed, " and I want you to tell her that this wish of Mr. Bolingbroke's is a mere whim that need not be regarded." The lawyer rubbed his chin reflectively. "Well, I could scarcely do that," he said, "because my late client made a great point of the young lady making her home here. You see she was not altogether such a stranger as you may suppose. He had heard of how she busied herself among the poor of London, and though, I daresay, he never sent her a guinea to help on the work, I can tell you he was proud of her in his odd, shy way."

"But how could he know so much about Rosa ? " asked the lady in some surprise. The lawyer stroked his chin, and shook his head. " There are such things as private inquiry offices," he said, but he declined to say anything further on the subject ; and Miss Harker proceeded on a tour of inspection through the lower rooms, under the guidance of Jenkins, the butler, while Mr. Williams conducted Rosa to the room where the body of her uncle lay. BOLINGBROKE'S FOLLY. 12 The girl was deeply touched at the forlorn aspect of everything around her. " Oh, why did he not send for me, or even answer my letters ? " exclaimed Rosa through her tears, as she looked down at the white, drawn face lying before her. " He doubtless met with some bitter disappointment in early life, but I, who knew him so well, am certain that a kinder-hearted man than Mr. Felix Bolingbroke never lived," said the lawyer.

" It was this kindness of heart that led him to leave all his property to you, my dear young lady," added the lawyer. " But what am I to do with it ? " asked Rosa ; " you say there are no conditions in the will." " No, not one. When I spoke of clauses to this effect, my client said, ' No, no, let her find out the way to help my poor people herself, only tell her I should like her to live in the old mansion.' " " But as it is, Mr. Williams ? " exclaimed the girl, looking round the desolate room in some dismay. " No, no, my old friend never meant that ; he intended that you should make it a fitting abode for yourself and, Miss Harker. There is plenty of money waiting to be spent, and we can soon have it made smart and comfortable, if you only give me the order." " Thank you, I'll think about it, Mr. Williams ; but I should like to find out first how much of the work could be done by the people in the neighbourhood."

The lawyer stroked his chin. " Better get men from London," he said. " Oh yes ! I shall get some men from London, of course ; I know two or three who are out of work just now, and " "But, my dear young lady, you will find that business is business, and charity charity, and that it won't do to mix the two together." "But, you see, I don't believe in what is termed charity ; I believe in helping people to help themselves. I wonder THE HEIRESS. ■3 whether we could find a strong, tidy, capable woman in the village who could get two or three rooms in order for my aunt. I do not mind putting up with things myself ; but aunt is very particular, and that slovenly girl does not look as though she was of much use." The meal that had been prepared for them convinced Rosa that she must find some help at once, for her aunt declined to touch anything but a few biscuits and a cup of tea, declaring that the sight of Betsy's hands had taken all her appetite away.

Miss Harker tried to persuade Rosa to go back to London with Mr. Williams, and return again for the funeral ; but the young lady was unwilling to do this. " I will go out and find somebody who can come and help us make things comfortable, auntie," she said ; and shortly afterwards she went out on a tour of inspection through the village, in search of a cottage whose appearance promised that the house-mistress was something above the ordinary slattern. At length she came to a carpenter's shop, where an elderly man was sawing some wood, and in a pause in his work his eyes fell upon Rosa looking wistfully into the shed. He guessed at once who she was, and came forward to the door. " Can I do anything for you, ma'am ? " he said. " 1 don't know, I'm not sure ; but I want a clean, capable young woman, who can do a little cooking, and make herself useful."

For answer the man opened a door at the side of the shed, and called "Mother, mother, come here a minute ! " then, turning to the door, he said, "We've got a daughter at home just now. She came home from her place ill, and we thought she'd better bide with us for a bit. I was telling the lady about Lizzie, mother," he said, as an elderly woman came forward. "It's Miss Bolingbroke, I reckon, and she's asking for somebody to help at the Hall ; but you'd know best about it." " Will you stepjnside, ma'am, and see our Lizzie ? She was two years in her last place, and her mistress was sorry to part with her, but the air was close, I suppose ; any way, she was too ill to do her work ; but since she's been home she's picked up wonderful, and would make a strong woman yet, if she didn't have to go back to London to find a place.

But, you see, there are no places in the country now for poor girls, and so what are t hey to do ? " While she had been speaking the woman had led Rosa into a neat, sanded room, where a young woman sat at needle work. "The lady wants somebody to help at the Hall, Lizzie," said her mother, by way of introduction. The young woman rose and greeted Rosa with a curtsey. She still looked weak and delicate, but was so clean and neat in her appearance, that the young lady determined to engage her, if it was only for the lighter work of waiting at table and attending upon her aunt ; and she explained this in as few words as she could, and added that she should be glad of some further help if the carpenter or his wife could recommend her where to find a strong capable woman. " There's Widow Thompson," said the man ; " she was always a clean, tidy body.

Lizzie might fetch her to see the lady here ; " and Lizzie put on her bonnet and went down the street, while her father described to Rosa how this had once been a thriving village of chair-makers, but how the industry had fallen off, and the young men migrated to the towns, and a general state of stagnation settled down upon the neighbourhood. In the midst of the talk Lizzie came in with the Widow Thompson, a bony, careworn, depressed woman, but. clean and capable-looking ; and Rosa had soon arranged that she should come with Lizzie to the Hall in about half an hour, that rooms might be made comfortable for her aunt before nightfall, and a decent dinner prepared before Mr. Williams took his departure.

Chapter II. The Village Of Hayfield

"IJI^HATEVER shall I do with all this—" "rubbish " a fTO was w^at R°sa was about to call her uncle's col- 'SSKwE' lection of fossils, stones, and shells, but she kept back the word, out of respect for his memory, although she could not appreciate his hobbies. " I should throw it all away ; it is no earthly use to any body," decided Miss Harker, who stood just inside the door of what had been Mr. Bolingbroke's favourite room. Shelves, boxes, tables, and chairs were crowded with an indiscriminate litter of what looked very like road-rubbish, some labelled carefully, others just thrown together in little heaps. There were one or two roughly-made cabinets standing against the wall, hut these were full, and there seemed no receptacle ready for all the specimens that lay about. Rosa looked round in perplexity.

" This room must be cleared for the workmen to come into," she said, half aloud. " Of course it must ; and I should sweep all the rubbish into a basket or box, and send it up to the lumber attic, if you don't like throwing it away," said her aunt, in a decided tone. But Rosa shook her head. " I feel bound to carry out uncle's wishes as far as I can understand them, and I am sure he would not like that. I'll see if Lizzie's father can make me some more cabinets to put them into, and some day I may find somebody who understands them as uncle did." The ladies had been at the Hall a month now, Rosa be coming every day better acquainted with the village and surrounding neighbourhood, and her aunt passively waiting for her to grow tired of what she looked upon as a mere girlish craze. " Every Bolingbroke must have a hobby of some sort, I believe, but Rosa will soon tire of hers, for the place is dull and uninteresting, and the people too."

This was how Miss Harker wrote to an intimate friend, and what she fully believed. But the dull, stagnant lives of the villagers, so repulsive to all Miss Harker's notions of refinement, were full of inte rest to Rosa. " If I can only rouse them into being discontented, I shall have made a beginning," she said, one day. " Rosa, what do you mean ? Poor people ought to be content with that state of life to which it has pleased God to call them," said her aunt, tartly. " But, auntie, you cannot believe that God ever called people to such a state as our villagers are in now. Man and the demon of selfishness have pushed them into it, if you like, and we can never lift them out of it until we make them discontented enough to struggle for themselves. Now I mean to begin with Ramsay the carpenter.

He made those clumsy cabinets for uncle, and I mean to have him up here, and make him so dissatisfied with them that he will make the next a great deal better." "If you want well-made, neat things, why not send to London at once. All you would have to do would be to write an order, and the matter would be settled," said Miss Harker. HA YFIELD. 17 " And my laziness fostered. It has been just that sort of thing, I expect, that has caused all the mischief. People are ready enough to give money in charity, but they won't give a little thought and trouble, that is often worth more than money. No ; Ramsay shall make the cabinets, and I shall insist upon having them well and neatly made, too." But when Rosa went down to the carpenter's shop she found there was no litter of shavings about as usual, and, gcing into the sanded parlour, she found the old man was laid up with an attack of rheumatism.

She told her errand, however, at which the old man's eyes sparkled as he listened. " It's the very job for my John," he exclaimed, "and he's coming down here to-morrow. I taught him his trade, ma'am, when this was a busy village in the chair trade ; but work got slack, and he, like the rest of the young fellows, thought he could do so much better in a town, and so he went to Manchester first, and then to London. But work has been bad there lately, and three of his children have been ill, and so mother wrote him last week that, as Lizzie was off our hands again now, he'd better bring the children down here and stay a bit himself, as he ain't over strong. His wife goes out to a day's washing now and then, so she'll manage to rub along with the other two while he's away ; but if he can earn a few shillings while he's here, it'll be a good help towards the expense of coming down, and I ain't afraid but what his work'll please you."

But Rosa was not so pleased with the arrangement as Ramsay seemed to be. " I wanted you to make this cabinet yourself, for I feel sure you could do better work than you have put into the others, and Jenkins tells me you made them for my uncle." " So I did, miss, and I was heartily ashamed of it when it was done, but Squire said anything would do, so as he could put his stones into it ; and, somehow, it ain't as easy to turn out good work when you've just had nothing but clumsy jobs for years and years." c BOLINGBROKE 'S POLL Y. 18 " I see ; but still, I should have liked you to make this cabinet, only, as I want it done quickly, to get the stones out of the way, ready for the workmen to come in, I shall be glad if your son can do it," said Rosa. Young Ramsay came up to the Hall the morning after his arrival.

A tall, pale, delicate-looking man, something like his sister, and while he was taking Miss Bolingbroke's direc tions for the making of the cabinet, she learned something more about the history of the village. It seemed that it was not so much because the trade had declined, as that the younger and more skilled workmen had grown dissatisfied with the cramped life of their native village, and charmed with the reports of high wages to be gained in town, had thrown up their employment at home, to try and better their fortunes. " It was a chum of mine who got work on the new rail way," said Ramsay, " that set me off. He was sent to Man chester from our station here, and he wrote to us about the sights and doings there, and the high wages we could get for all sorts of carpenters, and cabinet work, that three of us threw down our tools, and said we'd be off.

But, bless you, we were not much better off for all our high wages, for lodg ings and everything was so dear, we spent most as much as we could earn. We didn't say much about this, though, when we wrote home, for fear we should be laughed at, but we told about the gay life in town, and of course there was plenty ready to follow our example, till at last the old trade was broken all to pieces for want of hands to do the work." Here the speaker was interrupted by a violent fit of coughing. When it was over the young lady said, " Have you had any advice for that cough, Mr. Ramsay ? " " Yes, ma'am, but I can't say that it's likely to be much use to me. The doctor says I ought not to live in London, the place don't suit me ; but there, I must stay where my work is, and make the best of things, for there is the wife and children to think of now.

When mother wrote and HAYFIELD. 19 asked me to bring the youngsters down while I was out of a job, I thought I'd come and stay a few days, for maybe the fresh air will set me up a bit for the winter, and now, as this work is wanted quick, why it will give me a chance of stopping longer, and I daresay I shall lose the cough altogether ; it was only fresh air I wanted, the doctor said." " What a pity you cannot stay altogether," said Rosa. " Ah, ma'am, if a good many of us who went off and crippled the old trade could only have looked forward ten or fifteen years, I don't fancy we should have been in such a hurry to get away. Not but what the life is very dull, specially in the winter. You see there is nothing in the way of amusement but the beershop taproom, where friends can get together and talk, or may-be have a tune on the fiddle, while the fire blazes up the chimney.

This is the only enjoyment a good many understand down here in the country, but in town things are different. All sorts of things are astir there, and these are more to a young man of spirit and energy than mere money." " But why should the beershop be the only place of amusement in the village ? " said Rosa eagerly. " I don't know ma'am ; I'm only telling you how things are," said John Ramsay. " I could be content with my own fireside and a book or a newspaper now, and most of us would be glad to come back to the old spot, for the sake of the children, if there was a school they could go to ; but we don't think of these things when we're young," he added, regretfully. He took the measurements for the cabinet, and went away, but what he had said set Rosa thinking. Her uncle had left her this property free and unfettered.

It had never belonged to her father, because he was a younger son, but it had been in the Bolingbroke family for genera tions, therefore her duty was plain. To help these people who had a most positive claim upon her was doubtless the unexpressed wish of her uncle in making her his sole heiress, and how to do this, in the best manner possible, was what she must set herself to find out. At the present time the village was half depopulated. Its inhabitants were for the most part agricultural labourers who worked on distant farms. They were away all day, and after their long walk home at night were too tired to do anything but roll into bed, or sit in the alehouse bawling and dozing until bedtime. Their children as they grew up, invariably migrated to the towns, doubtless from the reasons adduced by John Ramsay, unless it was the stupid or idle, to whom the exertion of making such a change was too much trouble.

Now the problem Rosa set herself to solve, was how, so far as Hayfield was concerned, all this could be altered. She knew what life among the London poor was. How every labour market was overstocked, and how the fierce struggle of life was daily growing fiercer, through the influx of fresh workers from the country districts, many of them unskilled in town labour. Although she was but a girl of nineteen, it was not the first difficult problem she had had to solve. As an earnest worker in the mission-school of a crowded London parish, she had been confronted with difficulties that only a thoughtful sympathy could overcome. One of the lessons she had learned was, that to be in too great a hurry over any social change was only to court defeat ; so she decided to proceed very cautiously, and not to tell any one at present what was the ultimate end she had in view.

She would try to get John Ramsay to stay here, now he had come, by way of a beginning. Fortunately for her purpose, there was plenty of work to be done in the old Hall, if she were not in too much haste to get it completed ; and so, when he came again, and before the cabinet was finished, she told him what she wanted him to do about the house. When she had enumerated all her requirements, in the way of repairs and alterations, John Ramsay said, " I could HA Y FIELD. 21 do it all, ma'am, if I had the time, but do you know it would take nearly a twelvemonth to do it as it ought to be done." "Well, yes ! I suppose it would take quite as long as that, for I daresay I should find out some more things I wanted before it was all finished, but still I should like you to undertake it." The man's face flushed with astonishment and pleasure.

" You offer me a year's work, ma'am ? " he exclaimed. " Yes, and I should like you to bring your family down here to live." " A-ah ! " breathed Ramsay, slowly. "Why, what is the difficulty? " asked Rosa. " Well, ma'am, I'm truly thankful for your offer, and I hope you won't feel offended at what I'm going to say, but there isn't a house in the village, except my father's, that I should care to bring my wife into. Perhaps you haven't seen them beyond the outside, Miss Bolingbroke ; but I can tell you that most of them are little better than pigsties. There is scarcely a roof but is leaky, or a window that is mads to open, except in my father's house." " Are things really so bad as that ? " said Rosa, in dismay. " Yes, ma'am ; my father was only speaking of it last night, and the cottages that are empty are in worse condition than those which are occupied."