Mrs. Willoughby's Octave. A tale

Front matter

MRS. WILLOUGHBYS OCTAVE. Mrs. Willoughbys Oct a ve A TALE By Emma Marshall /^ Author of Life's Aftermath,' ' /;/ Colstons Days! £-"<-. LONDON SEELEY &* CO., 54, FLEET STREET 1884 The right of translation is reserved. CONTENTS. CHAPTER PAGE I. HEATHFIELD- - - - - - I II. LITTLE MISS JOHNSTONS - - - - II III. SETTLING IN- - - - - - 25 IV. LETTERS - - - - - - 39 V. OPINIONS - - - - - - 50 VI. CONTRASTS - - - - - - 64 VII. INTERIORS - - - - - - 76 VIII. A WALK TO CHURCH - - - - 88 IX. AN UNEXPECTED GUEST - - - - 99 X. THE GLIMMER OF LIGHT - -' - - Il6 XI. THE MUSIC OF 'THE OCTAVE' - - - I23 XII. BROXHOLME - - - - - - 140 XIII. AN ARRIVAL ------ I49 XIV. REFUGE - - - - - - l6j XV. ST. BENEDICT'S CAVE - - - - I7§ XVI. SAVED - - - - - - 194 XVII. BROXHOLME - - - - - 203 XVIII. THE MEETING - - - - - Contents.

VI CHAPTER PAGE XIX. THE WANDERER'S RETURN - - - - 228 XX. LETTERS ------ 240 XXI. AWAKENING - - - - - - 256 XXII. FAINT, YET PURSUING - 268 XXIII. PLANS ------ 282 XXIV. NEW PATHS ------ 295 XXV. THE NEW ORDER - - - - - 31 1 XXVI. THE SUDDEN CHANGE - ILLUSTRATIONS. PAGE PRIOR HAMPSTEAD .... - 90 THE AVENUE - - - - - - - J. 42 ST. BENEDICT'S ROCK - - - - -188 THE CHESTNUTS 3M

Chapter I. Heathfield

' Mother, I do believe there is another van of furniture coming to St. Winifred's. Yes ! and such shabby old things. They look as if they had come out of a broker's shop in Valehead. Do look, Gerard ! here comes such a funny clock, and a doll's house. There must be a little girl in the family.' The speaker was a girl of fifteen, tall and slim, and well dressed — perhaps a little too well dressed for her age. She was stationed at the bay-window of a house called Heathfield, and looked across a very muddy dirty road to another house called St. Winifred's. Now these names may bring to your mind very romantic places, full of associations of past and present. I must at once dispel the illusion by tell ing you that Heathfield and St. Winifred's were two prosaic red-brick houses faced with white stonework.

Each house had a bay-window, with two stories above it, and an entrance at the side, raised by steps above the level of the road which separated them. There were gardens in front, and gardens behind. The front windows commanded a very pretty view of a common or down, broken into little irregular dips and emi nences, where the bracken still found its place, and the hawthorn bushes in the spring were a mass of snowy blossoms. For all this, Heathfield and St. Winifred's were but suburban residences, and stood, with a dozen others with tempting names, all along the edge of this common. The great city of Vale head was stretching out its arms wider and wider every day, and houses of every size and pretension lay between Heathfield and the great manufacturing centre, which grew larger and murkier and, so re port said, richer every year.

Downside Park was at the farthest limits of Vale head, on the western side, and was sought after by people who had to consult economy, as the rent of houses was very much cheaper than that of those nearer the amusements and shops of the flourishing town in the valley. So much for the houses, that you may not build too much upon their names, or fancy them at all grander than they were. And now for the people who inhabited them. The fashionably dressed lady leaning back in a HEATHFIELD. 3 comfortable chair by the fire was Maude Burnley's mother. She raised herself a little that she might catch a sight of the van, and then said : ' Do not be seen staring at the people, Maude. Gerard, come away from the window.' ' There are not any people, mother — it's only things,' said Maude, making no attempt to leave her position. ' Oh, do look ! — there goes a box of books bang into the mud !

How badly it must have been packed.'. • ' I say,' exclaimed Gerard, ' it is not a cheerful afternoon for a removal. This nasty sort of drizzling rain wets everything in a sly way. There comes another shaky old wardrobe, and another bookcase.' And now the drawing-room door opened, and a girl of nineteen came in. She was dressed very plainly in black, and her hair, instead of being curled and frizzed like a doll's in a shop, or like Maude's, was gathered back from a very straight forehead, and closely plaited in a low knot. She had a small canvas in her hand, and she set it up against the wall on a little table, saying : ' I think I have finished this picture now, Aunt Katherine. Do you like it ?' Again there was a slight elevation of Lady Katherine's head from the cushion of the chair, and she said : ' Hum — yes.

I think it's rather nice, but I am no great judge. Isn't the cat's paw too big ?' I — Then the reclining attitude was resumed, and the book which was apparently so interesting again absorbed the reader's attention. The little artist said not a word, but stood gazing at her work with a sad, wistful eyes. ' If I had some one to care, how nice it would be,' she thought. ' They don't care what my pictures are like — they don't understand — they don't know. How should they ? The cat's paw too big ! I know it is not ! As if the child, hugging her only friend, were not of a hundred times more importance than the cat's paw !' 'What did you make the child ragged for?' Gerard now exclaimed. He had for a moment left the post of observation in the bay-window, and came round to look at the picture. ' But, I say, Frieda, it is awfully jolly !

The child isn't much of it, but the cat ! It makes me long to tickle its head and make it purr.' And now Maude came to add her note of criticism. ' Oh ! I love the pussie, but I hate the child — such a forlorn, stupid little thing in that tattered frock ! Are you going to sell the picture ?' The colour came into Frieda's pale face, and she said in a low voice : ' If I can.' ' I can't think what you do with all your money, Frieda ; you never buy anything pretty, and very scldcm give away anything.' HE A THFIELD. 5 ' I do wish you would not be so impertinent, Maude,' Frieda said, her dark eyes flashing on the little fair, curly-headed beauty, who was one of those provoking girls who think themselves privileged to say anything, and are often encouraged to do so by their elders and betters when they ought to be checked — or, as Gerard would have said,' well snubbed.' ' There, now she is off in a huff !' exclaimed Maude, as the door opened and shut again with a sharp sound.

Doors often express irritation, when words have scarcely done so. Again Lady Katherine looked up. ' Dear ! what a noise ! who is banging the door like that ?' ' Frieda in one of her tantrums, that's all,' said Maude, who had gone back to the window. ' She has a very bad temper,' said Lady Katherine. ' It is most unfortunate for us ; but I don't know from whom she inherits it. Your poor father's brother was a very good-natured man, though so sadly imprudent, marrying on a small living, and having a wife so totally unable to manage for him. Is that a carriage stopping here ?' ' No, mother ; it is at St. Winifred's. Oh, it is a fly crammed with people. I do believe it is the people arriving as well as the furniture. Oh, Gerard, do look ! — quick, count them ! There are four boys and a girl, and a big boy on the box.

And here's another fly !■ — it is most exciting ! — boxes piled up ; and there is an old, no, a middle-aged lady, like yourself, mother, getting out, and a little tiny girl, and a small boy in knickerbockers, and a fat nurse, and lots of packages. Well ! where can they sleep to-night ? The furniture is only just put in ; they will have to sleep on the floor.' 'What sad gossip!' said Lady Katherine, in the sort of deprecating tone in which she often addressed her children. ' My dear Maude, take care you are not seen ; it is so underbred to pry into other people's affairs. How many children do you say there are ?' By this time Lady Katherine herself had drawn nearer the bay-window, well shielded from observa tion by the folds of the curtain ; but to judge by the gold eyeglasses which she fitted on her highly-arched nose, and the expression of her face, she was more interested in the arrival of her neighbours than she wished to appear. ' I think the name is Willoughby,' she said. ' Thompson said it was a lady with a host of children.

Well, I hope they are less trouble to her than my two are to me.' ' Just as if we were a scrap of trouble to you, dear mumsie !' Maude said, going up to her tall handsome mother, and nestling close to her. ' We are not any trouble — nothing but pleasure to our dear old mumsie.' w Lady Katherine caressed the thick curly hair of her little daughter, and said : HE A TH FIELD. 7 ' Miss Masterman complained of you again to-day, Maude. I shall be compelled to change your gover ness, I expect ; for it is most trying to have these perpetual fault-findings and disagreements.' ' Mother, darling, do let me go to school ; I should get on fifty times better. It is so dull sitting up there with old Ready.' ' Maude!' ' That's Gerard's name for her. Why, he's gone !' she said, peeping round her fold of curtain. ' I dare say he is gone into the dining-room, where you have a very good view of St. Winifred's. He is deeply interested in the heap of boys.

Shall we know them, mother — will you call on them ?' ' I shall enquire about them first, my dear. It does not do to trust altogether to a name, though Willoughby is certainly a very good one. Now, darling, do go and prepare your history for Miss Masterman ; and have you practised an hour to-day ?' ' No, only ten minutes ; but here goes !' and Maude darted to the piano, and began to rattle off her scales. ' Oh ! hush, Maude ! — pray go to the schoolroom piano ; and do be careful about your practice. Miss Masterman says ' But Maude did not wait to hear what Miss Master man said ; for before Lady Katherine could finish her sentence, she was gone. Gerard was already in the schoolroom — not, I am afraid, at his preparation for the next day, but deep in the pages of one of Jules Verne's books, which, however amusing in their way, are not exactly of the kind to help a boy of sixteen to master a difficulty in Xenophon. ' I say, Maude, don't strum,' he said ; ' I can't put up with it ; let's talk.

What do you think of all those boys coming next door, or rather " over the way " ? I like the look of the big fellow on the box of the first fly. Of course I shan't have anything to do with the kids. And there is a girl for you ; so we shall be set up in the article friend.' ' It all depends upon whether mother will call or not.' ' Call ! of coarse she will.' Maude shook her head. ' I am not so sure. If she thinks the Willoughbys are " somebodys," she will call fast enough ; but if she thinks they are " nobodys," like poor Mrs. Jones at Grassmere, or the little old lady at Belle Vue, nothing will make her call.' 'What a shame!' said Gerard vehemently. 'I hate these stuck-up notions.' 'Well,' said Maude doubtfully, 'there are differ ences, you know.' 'Stuff! This is an age of progress, and by the end of the next century you will see there won't be such silly' pride tolerated.' HEATHFIELD. 9 ' I shan't see it,' said Maude, laughing, ' nor you either, unless we live to a hundred and ten, like the old woman in Thompson's rhyme, who ' " Lived to the age of a hundred and ten, And died from the fall of a cherry-tree then." ' ' Plucky old lady !' said Gerard. ' I hope she got as many cherries as she wanted first.

But I am in sober earnest, Maude. The whole face of things is changing. Power, culture, genius — these are to be the signs of the true aristocrats of the coming age. The whole pack of lords and ladies, and earls and dukes, will be just nowhere.' These sentiments came with strange effect from a young gentleman, who at sixteen was quite contented with his very moderate success in the Valehead Col lege, and whose ' culture ' and ' powers ' had not lifted him above the ' upper fourth,' or crowned him as yet with any very marked distinction. ' Well, I am going to write my history paper now for Miss Masterman ; so be quiet, there's a dear boy.' A momentary silence followed, and then Gerard broke out again : ' I say, Maude, I think it is a shame to tease Frieda as you do.' ' Tease her ! I am sure I don't !' ' Yes, you do.

She has a right to earn money and spend it. What business is it of yours ? I know Frieda has a hard time of it with us, and we ought to be kinder to her. She is very clever, and a real artist, and she is always ready to do anything for us when we ask her.' ' Oh, I know that ; but I think she is very huffy, and easily put out. Think of her this afternoon, how she bounced out of the room : and she is gone to shut herself up, I dare say, in her own room, and we shall see no more of her till dinner. I think,' said Maude, with a sidelong glance in a mirror over the chimney-piece — ' I think, after all, it's better to be ornamental than an artist. Now, do be quiet, Gerard, and let me work, if you are determined to be idle.' Maude's idea of work was not, perhaps, the one usually recognised, for she left her books and papers several times to go to the window to see how the newly arrived neighbours were progressing.

Then she took an interlude of a few bars of a sonata, then played two or three of Bettini's exercises, and finally wrote in her essay on the time of Henry VIII., that he was so disappointed with his wife, Anne of Austria, because she was quite unlike the photograph that had been sent him, that he divorced her, and immediately married some one else. Who that ' some one ' was, was left for Miss Masterman to decide.

Chapter II. Little Miss Johnstone

Meanwhile Frieda, in stead of shutting herself up in her own room, as Maude had prophesied, had put on her tightly - fitting ulster, and was skimming the un even surface of the downs at a rapid pace. ' So soon to fail again !' she was saying to herself. ' So soon to be angry, and blaze out in a fury, because they did not like my picture, and then asked me what I did with my money.' Frieda was in that mood when the drizzling rain which came on the breath of a wind blowing from the Channel was a positive relief to her. The murky sky above her, the trees dripping with moisture, and sending their sere leaves one by one to the ground, were more in harmony with her feelings than a bright sun, blue sky, and waving branches of emerald green would have been. She was one of those people who always find exercise useful when greatly harassed or irritated.

And she walked straight on at the same rapid pace for two miles, till the gathering twilight of the October evening warned her to return. That calm exterior of hers often misled those who knew her as to her real nature. And those who knew her, or cared to know her, were few. Her father and mother both died within a month of each other. When she was scarcely twelve. Her uncle had brought her to his home, saying to his wife : ' I did not bring the boy too, as I should have liked to do ; but I thought you would object to two children. A relation of poor Alicia's has taken him ; and though, perhaps, rather out of our rank in life, I thought it was the best thing to decide upon.' 'Well, really!' Lady Katherine had exclaimed, ' you could not expect me to take two children : especially when, as we know, their mother was not a person of any family.' Mr. Burnley had given a very emphatic shrug of his shoulders, but he said coolly : ' No, my dear, I certainly did not expect it ; and, as the result has proved, I was wise.

The little girl was poor Reginald's idol, and he particularly com mended her to me. He said she was of a very sensitive and reserved disposition, and the boy was far better fitted to fight his way in the world.' While her uncle lived, Frieda had felt a sense of home in his house ; but when after a short illness he died, scarcely two years after her father, the aspect of everything changed. Lady Katherine had not helped her husband to keep his expenses within their income, and the two children, Gerard and Maude, had been indulged in every way. On Mr. Burnley's death, it was found that great retrench ments were necessary. Carriages and horses, and the easy luxurious life of a country gentleman, were all things of the past. Burnley Manor had to be let, and a good many things sold to meet the out standing debts.

Lady Katherine had brought her husband very little beyond her title, and her rela tionship to old Scotch nobility. Her brother, the Earl of Littlehales, had nothing to give her but advice to retrench at once. And her retrenchment consisted in her taking Heathfield, Downside Park : the near neighbourhood to Valehead College for Gerard, and of masters and governesses for Maude, being the chief inducements held out. At Heathfield, therefore, Lady Katherine had contrived for five years to live what she believed to be a life of great self-denial, on some eight or nine hundred a year, and to feel herself injured by the additional burden of Frieda Burnley, her dead husband's orphan niece. Ms. Burnley had expressed in writing his desire that Frieda should not leave his wife and children, and he had enforced this by word to the child herself, as well as to Lady Katherine, in his last ill ness. ' She will be a comfort to you,' he had said to his wife. ' Let her remain, whatever happens.' While to Frieda he had said : ' Remember, you are never to leave the shelter of your aunt's roof, till you exchange a home with her and my children for one of your own.' Poor Frieda thus felt herself in a manner pledged to stay, as Lady Katherine was pledged to keep her.

To both the wishes of the dead were sacred, though there was no sympathy between them. ' My niece is not in the least a useful member of my family,' Lady Katherine would say. ' She is not a needlewoman, or practical in anything. Some young girls of eighteen or twenty are most helpful, but Frieda is seized with the idea that her metier is art, and I do not like to undeceive her.' ' My aunt, Lady Katherine, is the most utterly selfish person in the world,' Frieda thought. She did not say so, for she had at this time no friend to whom she could speak freely. She had studied at the Art School at Valehead, and when in the ' life model ' class had made something akin to friendship with a little clever woman, long past her premiere jeunesse, who had to work for her old father and invalid sister, and who had, after years of painting landscapes, with mountains as a background and little boats on the water as a foreground, found she could not draw !

It was a humiliating discovery, but it was met bravely. ' Little Miss Johnstone,' as every one called her, from the master at the Art School to the porter at the door, set herself at thirty to go through 'freehand,' and study perspective and geometry. To go back to learn your alphabet when you be lieve yourself to be an advanced scholar is, it must be confessed, a trial; but Miss Johnstone proved equal to it. She had her reward. Her progress was rapid, and her still-life pictures had again and again taken prizes at the Kensington centre, while this year she had received one of the much-coveted medals. As Frieda was turning towards the lights which were beginning to glimmer like stars along the edge of Downside Park, she came upon little Miss John stone, with her folio under her arm. ' Why, Miss Burnley, I did not expect to meet you so late as this !

I had to go over to Eastbury with the sketch I have made of the interior of Mrs. Townley's " high-art " drawing-room. She is pleased with it, which is more than I am. What affectation there is in these rooms, to be sure ! I will turn with you, for the pleasure of your company, and return by the back road to Valehead, if you will let me.' ' Oh, I am so glad I met you !' Frieda said. ' I have just finished my picture, " Her only Friend," and I want you to criticize it.' ' I will come and see your picture with pleasure, but don't ask me for criticism ; you know I am a novice myself. Five years ago I could not draw a straight line, much less could I draw a circle like Giotto. I am not sure whether I can do it now,' she added, with a laugh. Frieda was too well used to Miss Johnstone's self depreciation to notice it much.

She said rather abruptly : ' You know I like those who know anything about painting to come down upon me ; but for ignorant people who positively cannot distinguish between a light and a shadow — it is disgusting !' 'That's a strong term, my dear,' Miss Johnstone said. ' Who has been so impertinent as to come down upon " Her only Friend" ?' 'You need not ask. I live with unsympathetic, dense people, who look on me as just fit to paint a signboard for the Queen's Head, at Eastbury, and nothing more.' ' Well, it requires talent to paint a signboard,' was Miss Johnstone's wise rejoinder. ' So the house next yours is taken ? I see lights in the window.' ' Yes ; a huge family has just arrived — their last van of furniture had only preceded them by half an hour.' ' Dear me — that is cheerful !' said little Miss John- LITTLE MISS JOHaNSTONE. 17 stone. ' I always dislike an empty house near at hand — it is a body without a soul.

Well, I am glad you have neighbours.' ' It will not make much difference to me, I expect,' Frieda said, 'whether St. Winifred's is empty or full. Now, do come in.' ' I am scarcely fit to do so,' was the reply ; ' but I dare say I shall not see any one.' 'Oh no ! Come up to my room and look "at the picture, and I will try and get a cup of tea from Thompson.' Frieda's room was at the top of the house, and, though low, was large, and had two windows, one looking to the front, the other towards the house over the way. All Frieda's painting materials, her easel and her palette, were by the window, and on the deep window-ledge were several pictures. ' Her only Friend ' was on the easel, and Frieda struck a match and lighted the gas-burner near it, which threw out the figure of the child in strong contrast to the dark background. ' There, look at it, and make all your remarks, while I go and fetch a cup of tea.' Frieda crossed the passage to a room of the same proportions as her own, where a bright fire was burning, and a kettle singing on the hob. ' I thought you would be coming for your tea, my dear Miss Frieda,' Thompson said. ' I have kept V the water boiling.

Miss Maude has had the school room tea long ago. Why, where have you been ? The feather on your hat is dripping wet.' Frieda threw down her hat, and unbuttoning her ulster, said : ' Please get two cups ready, and I will come back directly. I want little Miss Johnstone to have some tea ; and would you mind making her a piece of toast ?' ' Very well ; I have got some butter in my cup board. But don't be long, for it's getting close upon dinner-time. It's nearly six.' Frieda vanished, and was soon standing by Miss Johnstone's side. ' Well, what do you think of it ?' ' It is the best picture you have done,' Miss John stone said. ' The cat's paw is not foreshortened perhaps as it ought to be, and ' ' That cat's paw !' Frieda exclaimed. ' I am doomed to hear about that. Yes, I see what you mean.

Anything else ?' ' The drapery of the child's ragged shawl is too angular. It should fall in rounder folds. But the face is beautiful !' ' How much may I ask for it, if Ross tells me to put a price on it— fifteen guineas ?' ' Yes ; but you may have to take ten.' Frieda clasped her hands together, a favourite gesture of hers when she was greatly moved. ' Oh ! I hoped you would say twenty. I do want the money so much.' Little Miss Johnstone turned quickly and looked at her. She often wanted money — to pay her rent — to pay for medicine for her father and sister — to buy clothes, food, coals — to pay the gas bill and the water company's bill ; but that Miss Burnley, Lady Katherine's niece, who was looked upon as of a superior order of being, should want money — crave for it so earnestly— surprised her.

Little Miss John stone was too refined in feeling to question her friend, or to besiege her with impertinent inquiries. So she merely said, in her simple, direct manner : ' I think fifteen guineas is quite as much as you must expect for " Her only Friend ;" but, of course, Ross may be of a different opinion.' Then Frieda put her hand upon Miss Johnstone's shoulder, and said : ' I want to get as much money as possible, to attain an object. I have told you I have a brother. He is much younger than I am ; but he is living with people, relations of our mother's, who don't care about the things he cares for. They send him to a second-rate sort of school, and Mr. Hunter says he is going to put him soon into his office. George hates the idea, and he writes to me about all his troubles. I am determined to get him out of the hands of these people who cannot appreciate him, and I mean to succeed.' 2—2 MRS. WILL OUGHBYS OCTAVE.

Frieda's pale cheeks were now flushed with crimson and her eyes were aglow with enthusiasm, as she said : ' Do you know what it is to work for one object, Miss Johnstone, and set yourself to succeed ?' ' Yes,' said Miss Johnstone quietly, ' of course I do. I had a distinct object in view when I went in at the Art School for freehand, after painting pictures for years which were worthless.' ' Ah, I know that ; but did you ever work for one aim — one person ? I am determined George shall go to Oxford ; and if I can, I mean to place him with a tutor. He is too old at fifteen to go straight to a public school for the first time, even if I could manage it. But I made up my mind when he came here for a visit last Christmas, and they all looked down upon him, that I would raise him to his right level.