Aileen Ferrers

Front matter

■ ■ ■ May, 1S74, NEW NOVELS at the LIBRARIES. LADY MORETOUN'S DAUGHTER. By Mrs. Eiloart. In 3 vols. Crown 8vo. cloth. " Carefully written. . . . The narrative is well sustained.1' — Athenæum. " An interesting story. . . Above tlie run of average novels." — Vanity Fair. "Will prove more popular than any ofthe author's former works. . . . Interesting and readable." — Hour. " A faithful and well-drawn picture of English life and character."— Edinburgh Daily Review. " Vividly sketched. . . . Written in a thoroughly fresh and interesting style. — Brighton Gazette. MARGARET AND ELIZABETH. A Story of the Sea. By Katherine Saunders, Author of " Gideon's Rock," &c. In 1 vol. Cloth, crown 8vo. "Simply yet powerfully told. . . . This opening picture is so exquisitely drawn as to be a sit introduction to a =tory of such simple pathos and power. ...

A very beautiful story closes as it began, in a tender and touching picture of homely happiness."— Pall Mall Gazette. BRESSANT. A Romance. By Julian Hawthorne. 2 vols. Crown 8vo. " The story as it stands is one of the most powerful with which we are acquainted." — Times. " Enough to make us hopeful that we shall once more have reason to rejoice whenever we hear that a new work is coming out written by one who bears the honoured name of Hawthorne." — Saturday Review. MR. CARINGTON. A Tale of Love and Conspiracy. By Robert Turner Cotton. In 3 vols. Cloth, crown 8vo. '* A novel in so many ways good, as in a fresh and elastic diction, stout unconvention ality, and happy boldness of conception and execution. His novels, though free spoken, wilt be some of the healthiest of our day." — Examiner.

TWO GIRLS. By Frederick Wedmore, Author of "A Snapt Gold Ring." In 2 vols. Cloth, crown 8vo. [jsust out. " A carefully-written novel of character, contrasting the two heroines of one love tale, an English lady and a French actress. Cicely is charming ; the introductory description of her is a good specimen of the well-balanced sketches in which the author shines." — Athenæum. IDOLATRY ; A ROMANCE. IN TWO VOLS. By Julian Hawthorne, In the Press, and will shortly appear. Henry S. King & Co. 65 Cornhill, & 12 Paternoster Row. BY SUSAN MORLEY. IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. HENRY S. KING & CO., 65, CORNHILL, AND 72, PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON. 1874.

Chapter I

T was the middle of July a few years ago, and the London season was nearly over. Most people who had country houses were already gone to them, and those who had not were making plans of every description. " Where to go " was, for the time, the problem of social science most frequently under discussion in the various circles of London society. " Have you and Gilbert settled any plans for the summer yet ?" said one of two ladies VOL. I. I in an open carriage, which was driving to wards Roehampton one fine, hot afternoon about five o'clock. " No," replied her companion, with rather an impatient little sigh. " There are lots of pleasant things one might do ; but the children are such a terrible tie !" The words sounded strange and unnatural from the lips of a young mother ; but, though they jarred upon her, Lady Grace Calvert expressed no disapprobation.

For her brother's sake she was persistently kind and forbearing to his wife. She merely glanced with momentary regret at the pretty, spark ling little brunette seated by her side, and then said quietly, " I suppose it will be late before Gilbert can take his holiday this year ?" " Not till the beginning of September," replied Mrs. Gilbert Ferrers; "and then, I believe, he will go to Scotland, and I suppose I shall go with him. But only conceive what he wants me to do in the meantime. Actu ally to take the children to the sea some where, and he will ' run down on Satur days !' " "I think both Willie and Hilda really require sea air, Theo," said Lady Grace. " So Mr. Edmonstone says ; and I have nothing to say against it, though of course it will be infinitely more troublesome and ex pensive than sending them to mamma at Beechfield, as we have always done, for two or three months ; and Gilbert is always worrying and grumbling about expense."

This undoubted fact might, perhaps, be accounted for by Mrs. Ferrers' own elaborate and varied perfection of costume, which was scarcely suited to her husband's means, con sidering that his official income from his post in one of the government offices was only a year, that his private fortune (though i — he was an earl's son) had been only ;£ 10,000, and that she herself had had absolutely no thing. Lady Grace, however, only said : — "Beechfield is rather a relaxing place I believe, and the children certainly need bracing this year." " Yes ; and I would have them braced," said Mrs. Ferrers ; " though it will be a great disappointment to mamma, and will cost an immensity. But / don't want bracing, so why should I go ? It will be much cheaper in every way if I don't, and Dixon is the most trustworthy creature possible.

She and Hannah would take every care of them ; but Gilbert has got a stupid crotchet into his head, and says that Willie is too old to be left for so long entirely to servants, and Hilda too delicate, and Jessie and baby too young." " And, surely, he is right," said Lady Grace. " Well, really, Grace, I should think good nurses could take care of children better than anybody ! What else do we pay them such awfully high wages for ? Now, would my being there do them the least bit of good ?" Lady Grace could not candidly say that she thought it would, so she was wisely silent, and Mrs. Ferrers went on. " It is too provoking just now, when Ronald Severn has asked me to go with the Marcus Vanes for a six weeks' trip in his yacht. The thing of all others I should enjoy ! It would quite set me up, too, after all the hot weather They are going to Norway, and there shall / be stuck up in wretched lodgings at some poky sea-side place, all alone with the children !"

" Rather tantalizing for you, no doubt," said Lady Grace. " But, for your children's sake, I am sure you will readily make the sacrifice, Theo !" Mrs. Ferrers laughed. " I shall make it, Grace, because I must, if Gilbert is determined to be so tiresome, but I shall certainly not make it readily. It is hard on Nellie Vane, too, for she and I always pull together capitally, and it is not every friend. you could do with for six weeks on board a yacht. How I envy you, Grace, with plenty of money, no one to interfere with you, and no one but yourself to please !" Lady Grace did not answer. It seemed to her so utterly unreasonable and un womanly, that Theo, who had crowded into the last three months as much amusement of ever^* description as was physically possible, should now complain of having to take her children to the sea, as if it were a penance.

What a wretched training, must theirs be, when their mother looked upon them only as " a terrible tie !" Lady Grace had not, as yet, any fixed summer plans for herself, and the idea now crossed her mind of takinga house by the sea somewhere, and having her brother's children to stay with her. Their mother would then be free, and their father could " run down on Saturdays," sure of being a welcome guest. The scheme would be a pleasant one for herself ; but she re strained the impulse to speak of it until she should have heard Gilbert's views, for she was by no means sure that he would, in any case, choose Theo to go yachting. He could, sometimes, exert a little necessary authority, though he far too rarely did so. Sir Ronald Severn was a first cousin of Theo's, and his sister, Mrs. Marcus Vane, was her especial friend ; but Lady Grace could not think them desirable companions for her, as they were even more thought less, worldly and frivolous than herself.

Lady Grace had never much in common with her giddy young sister-in-law, and had often regretted the infatuation which had made Gilbert marry her; but, though quite accustomed to hear her say innu merable wild and foolish things, equally devoid of taste and feeling, she had rarely been more disgusted than by the very genuine envy of herself which the young wife and mother had so coolly expressed. It was undoubtedly true that she was rich and absolutely independent. At eight and thirty she was still a very handsome and unusually attractive woman ; all the pleasures which society can give were at her command, and she had " no one but herself to please." For that misfortune she was envied. Her husband, General Calvert, and her three children, all lay in Indian graves, and for ten years she had been alone ; but neither the husband who had loved her so well and been so truly loved in return, nor the babies so fondly welcomed and so bitterly mourned, could be forgotten.

Lady Grace had wealth and beauty, birth and talent, and she filled a brilliant position in society, but her home was lonely ; and though she might resign herself to her lot, she could not think it one to be " envied," except by such a frivolous, heartless little being as her sister-in-law. The silence between the two ladies lasted until the carriage stopped at the door of the luxurious villa where Mrs. Hervey Wilcox was "at home from four to seven" to the greater part of the fashionable world. A year ago Mrs. Hervey Wilcox, a cousin of the Ferrers, was still Florence Vansittart. She was well-born, handsome, and clever, but she was no longer young, was poor, and with out a home, and she had readily accepted the great railway contractor, whose acquaintance she made at a German watering-place, and whose enormous fortune enabled her to keep her position in society.

Mr. Wilcox was a self-made man, but he seemed, fortunately, to have no relations ; and although he was not in the least like one of the gentlemen of his wife's world, he was too sensible and un assuming to be offensively vulgar. Lady Grace respected and liked him, and, thoroughly disapproving the cool neglect with which some of his wife's fashionable con nections treated him, she made a point of always paying him proper attention. This afternoon, when they had duly spoken to their hostess, and Theo had immediately joined some of her own set, she herself paused, before going into the gardens, to speak to Mr. Wilcox. He admired and liked Lady Grace, and knew that he could trust her never to give herself any fine lady airs, so that he now ventured to say to her, " There is a friend of mine here to-day, Lady Grace, who knows nobody, and it's a pity, for he is one of the pleasantest men I know.

May I introduce him to you ?" Lady Grace was rather aghast, for a friend of Mr. Wilcox's, who knew nobody, might easily prove a very severe infliction. She was, however, too kind and too really courteous to evade the request, and heroicafly prepared to make the best of it. Mr. Wilcox moved a few steps away, and touched the arm of a tall man who was standing with his back to them, at a table, looking at some photographs, an employment which of itself betrayed that he did, indeed, " know nobody." He turned round, and Lady Grace felt at once that it was a thoroughly familiar face, though one unknown in London society, and to which she could not at the moment give a name. "Mr. Lushington" was formally presented to " Lady Grace Calvert," without any warning whatever, and without any power of declining the honour, even had he wished to do so.

For a moment he looked awkward and annoyed, and uncertain of what to do or say. The next instant Lady Grace's rather languid, conventional courtesy of man ner gave place to eager interest, and she held out her hand with a bright, cordial smile of welcome. " Basil ! I did not know you were in Eng land. We have heard nothing of you for years. I am so glad to see you again ! Mr. Lushington and I are very old friends, Mr. Wilcox, and though, probably, he scarcely recognizes me, I am sure he remembers our happy days down at Wodenscroft, long ago." j) " I should be most ungrateful if I did not," replied Mr. Lushington. " I am very glad to have this chance of meeting you again, Lady Grace." Mr. Wilcox, well pleased at the unexpected success of his introduction, left them, to at tend to some newly arrived guests. " Now, Basil," said Lady Grace, " come out into the gardens with me, and find me a seat, and tell me all about your self."

Chapter II. Hey

went out through one of the open windows upon the lawn, which was now crowded with people. Lady Grace walked through them, returning salutations at almost every step, but seldom stopping to speak to any one. " We will go in search of peace and quiet," she said to her companion, and as the grounds were extensive, they were not long in finding a seat sufficiently out of the crowd to allow of comparatively undisturbed conversation. Then Lady Grace said, with a smile half amused and half reproachful, " How long have you been in England — in London — Basil ?" Mr. Lushington hesitated a little. " Six weeks," he said, reluctantly. " And you have never looked any of us up all this time ! Braithwaite is in London, and so is Gilbert," said Lady Grace. " You forget that I was never really inti mate either with Lord Braithwaite or Mr. Gilbert Ferrers," replied Mr. Lushington, " and after so many years had passed, I had no reason to suppose that they would care to see me.

If we had chanced to meet, it would have been different." " That shall pass for an excuse as to them, though rather a lame one," said Lady Grace ; -' but how is it that you have never been to see me? Did you really contrive not to know that I was living in London now, in a home of my own ?" " I cannot plead ignorance," answered Mr. Lushington, " I knew that you were in London, and I have been intending to come, but we live in such very different circles, that " " Yes ! That is right !" said Lady Grace. " You are too much ashamed of yourself to finish the sentence, and well you may be ! Did you really think, Basil, that all I should have learned in so many years of life was heartless indifference to my earliest friends ? For Arthur's sake, if not for your own, you must have been sure of a welcome, yet you allow yourself to be introduced accidentally at a party like this, and say ' you are very glad of this chance of meeting me again !' " Mr. Lushington laughed at her gentle but accurate imitation of his own rather shy and formal manner, and, with the laugh, all the ease of former intimacy returned.

" Be generous, Lady Grace, and spare me further ridicule. Chance or no chance, you must know how great a pleasure it is to me to meet you again after so many years." " Many indeed !" said Lady Grace, gravely. " It is eighteen years, all but a month or two, since you and Arthur hurried back from Scotland that September, to meet me in London and say ' Good-bye ' before I left England after my marriage. We were first at the Cape for five years, and then in India ; and when, after my husband's death, I returned to England, I found everything at home grievously changed. My father was dead. Wodenscroft, thanks to Braithwaite's cosmopolitan habits, was shut up. Poor Arthur also was dead. There was a new vicar in place of dear old Dr. Lushington, and no trace of you anywhere, except a vague report that you had something to do with making railways in Russia !

Five years ago we heard accidentally that you had been seen in London, but were gone again — and that is 2 vol. 1. all I know about you. Now tell me, what has really been happening to you all these years r " Hard work and plenty of it," replied Mr. Lushington. " My father's death, about a year after your marriage, left me quite inde pendent of all authority, and moderately so as to ways and means. I had gone to Ox ford to please him, but I had no fancy for either the Church or the Bar, and wished for some active life. A fortunate accident made me acquainted with Mr. Wilcox. I was lucky in getting into his office, and luckier still in getting into his favour. He has always given me abundance of well-paid work. His contracts extend pretty well over the world, and I have worked under him in Canada, in Russia, in South America, and other places too ; rising by degrees to be the chief in command under him wherever I was employed.

This spring he has summoned me home to become his partner. He has never had one hitherto, but now he wants some one to share his work and responsibili ties ; and though my stake in the business is very small compared with his, it is a capital thing for me in every way. It brings me back, too, to make London my headquarters, though I may often have to go abroad, whereas during the last sixteen years I have only been in England twice, and each time for scarcely a month." " And why have you isolated yourself so completely from your friends all this time ?" said Lady Grace. "No one could tell me anything about you." " I have not isolated myself from them all by any means," replied Mr. Lushington. " That only proves that I was right in saying that our circles were different. There were no people I ever much cared for among those families in the immediate neighbourhood of 2 — Wodenscroft, who were my only link with your family after Arthur was gone.

My communications with them soon died a natural death, and so you never heard of ... » me. " But when you first returned to England my father must have been still living, and even if you thought that my brothers were in a different set and would not care to see you, surely you might have gone to see him ? That you do not now call on Lady Braith waite I can understand." " I had good reason to know that a visit from me would be unwelcome to Lord Braithwaite," said Mr. Lushington. " He had been displeased with me before I left England. You were then in India. Not long afterwards I saw General Calvert's death in the newspapers, and the sketches given of his life told me all your sorrow, and that you were left alone. I wished to write to you, but I did not know where you were ; and even had I known it, I should hardly have ventured to intrude upon your grief."

" Real sympathy is never an intrusion," said Lady Grace. " I should have valued yours." " When next I was in London, five years ago," continued Mr. Lushington, "you were wintering at Algiers with some friends. Since I came back now, I have really been wishing to come to see you, and intending every day to do it ; but — I will make my own confession rather than let it come from you as an accusation — I have delayed day after day, because I dreaded, most unjustly I admit, to find that by this time you had forgotten all about me, and that the memories most sacred to me were nothing to you." " You, at any rate, are quite unchanged, I see," said Lady Grace. " I shall have to lecture you as I used to do in former days, on your cynical doubt of your fellow-creatures, and your absurd want of confidence in your self ; and remind you of the hackneyed saying about the morbid ' pride that apes humi lity !' However, here you are settled in London, and you cannot well refuse to visit me.

Jesting apart, Basil, don't talk foolish nonsense about ' circles,' which, as far as my experience goes, don't exist ; or if they do, they touch each other at such extraordinary and innumerable points, that they are re markably unmathematical figures ! Come and dine with me to-morrow, at eight. You will meet Braithwaite and one or two other people, to whom I should like to introduce you." She mentioned one or two names well known in the scientific and literary world. The invitation was accepted, and then Mr. Lushington asked a question about Gilbert Ferrers and his wife. " You will not meet them to-morrow," replied Lady Grace ; " but Gilbert's wife is here to-day. I shall introduce you to her, and then you must call." " And what became of poor Arthur's wife ?" said Mr. Lushington. "Arthur's wife?

He never married. What can you be thinking of ?" exclaimed Lady Grace. " I beg your pardon," said Mr. Lushington. " Perhaps I ought not to have alluded to a painful subject." " What is it all ?" asked Lady Grace, in unfeigned astonishment. " I see it is not that you are making a mistake, Basil, but that there is something of which I am igno rant. Did Arthur marry ? When ? And whom ? I never heard of his doing so." " I never for a moment imagined that you had not been told," replied Mr. Lushington. " I am sorry that I spoke of it." "And I am glad. Tell me all you know." " It is not much. I was, as you probably know, riding with Arthur at the time of the accident which killed him. I was living in London then, learning my business in Wilcox's office, and we were a good deal together, though not so much as we had been ; that was not possible.

Arthur was taken to his rooms in the Knightsbridge barracks, and I remained with him, but he only lived an hour. He could hardly speak intelligibly, but he managed to give me an address in Brompton and to make me understand that I was to break the news of his death to his wife. ' Grace would have been kind to her,' was all that I could make out afterwards. I went to the address he gave me, and there I found a young and very pretty girl. I don't think she could be more than eighteen. She was gentle and refined, but not quite a lady. I told her as well as I could, but the shock prostrated her completely." " Poor child !" said Lady Grace com passionately. " I hardly knew what to do ; but I made her give me her mother's address, and I telegraphed to her to come at once. Then I went to Lord Braithwaite.

A telegram had been sent to Wodenscroft instantly after the accident, for it was in December and no one was in town, and he was in London that evening. I told him of this poor girl, and he was at first disposed to be kind, but afterwards he refused to see her or to do anything for her. Arthur, it seemed, had married her secretly about three months previously. She was a nursery-governess I think, and her mother was a widow, and housekeeper to some gentleman near Newcastle. It was, of course, an utterly unsuitable connection for Arthur, but it was all quite respectable. Mr. Luttrell made every inquiry, and satisfied himself that there was no doubt whatever as to the marriage. Arthur had been extrava gant and was much in debt. Lord Braith waite paid everything ; but he would do nothing whatever for the young widow, and the poor girl went home with her mother.

My own belief was that your father was entirely influenced by Lady Braithwaite, who had come up to join him. Lord Ferrers was then in the East ; Gilbert was away, attached to some special diplomatic mission in America, and I could do nothinc.. I did remonstrate more than Lord Braithwaite thought me justified in doing, and he was very angry. After that, I could only trust in the influence of your brothers and yourself, when the facts became known to you. Before either of your brothers returned I had gone to Canada ; and from that day to this, I have never heard more of the matter." " It was never told to me'? said Lady Grace. " I will ask my eldest brother about it ; Gilbert, I am sure, knows as little as I do. I will also question Lady Braithwaite. It must have been her doing. Papa would never have been so hard if he had been left to himself.

Do you remember the mother's name and address ?" " I could find it, I think, in an old diary, if you want it," said Mr. Lushington. " I will ask you for it to-morrow evening if I do," she replied. " Probably Mr. Luttrell will know it as a matter of business. And now, much as there is to say, we must not talk any more. There are many people to whom I must speak, and some to whom I want to introduce you, so let us go back into the crowd."

Chapter III. Ady Grace Calvert

was the only surviving daughter by the first marriage of the late Earl of Braithwaite. Her eldest brother was seven, and Gilbert six, years older than herself. Two sisters, who had died in early childhood, had come next ; then Arthur and Grace, who were twins, and at whose birth their mother had died. It was so many years before Lord Braithwaite married again, that people had ceased to expect it ; but, when Lord Ferrers was already of age and Lady Grace fourteen, he married a handsome, fashionable, hard-natured young woman of seven and twenty, who was not popular with her step children, and did not even seem to try to be so, though there was never any breach of family peace. Lady Grace was fortunate in having an invaluable friend in the governess who had taken charge of her motherless in fancy, and who loved her and Arthur as if they had been her own children.

The vicar of the parish, Dr. Lushington, was a widower with one son. Basil was a month or two younger than Arthur and his sister, and they grew up inseparable companions. It was quite true that Basil Lushington had really known very little of the two elder boys, but he was like a brother to the twins. He and Arthur went to the same preparatory and public schools ; but on leaving Eton at eighteen, their paths separated. Arthur very soon got his commission in the Guards ; Basil went to Oxford. Lady Grace, meanwhile, on her " sunny side of the wall," had distanced them both. While they were still mere boys, she was a woman. At the end of her third season in society, when little more than twenty, she married General Calvert, a man more than twice her own age, and far from rich. It was said, of course, that but for the sake of escaping from her step-mother, the beautiful, popular Lady Grace Ferrers would never have made such a poor marriage.

But, though she might be glad to leave an uncongenial home, the marriage was one of real affection. Lady Grace truly loved and honoured her husband. Her marriage and departure from England was a great loss to her brother Arthur. He loved her better than any one in the world, and allowed her influence to keep him out of at least half the scrapes in which he would otherwise have been involved. She had always, too, been the mediator between him and his father. To Basil Lushington, her marriage was the abrupt end of a boy's romantic dream of making for himself a fortune and position worthy for her ultimately to share. Since those boyish days, he had knocked about in the world, and had mixed in all sorts of society, but Lady Grace had remained his ideal of what a woman ought to be, and he had really now delayed going to renew his acquaintance with her, from a secret dread of finding that her life in the fashionable world had spoiled her.

That fear was, once for all, removed by this first half-hour's conversation. Lady Grace might be a fashionable lady, but she was, as she had always been, unaffected, warm-hearted, and charming. It was about a year and a half after his sister's marriage, that Arthur Ferrers was killed while riding a young horse in Hyde Park. It reared, and losing its balance, fell back upon him, prushing -iim so terribly, that he only lived an hour. The fact was all that Lady Grace had ever heard, and now she knew why so few particulars had been written to her. She remained for another hour at Mrs. Wilcox's party, and then, being engaged to dine out, she drove home alone, leaving Theo to follow later with other friends. She was glad to be alone, for she could think of nothing but the forlorn condition of that poor young widow seventeen years ago, and her brother's dying words, " Grace would have been kind to her."