No New Thing

Front matter

I BY W. E. NORRIS AUTHOR OF * MATRIMONY ' 4 MADEMOISELLE DE MERSAC ' ETC. LN THREE VOLUMES VOL. I. LONDON SMITH, ELDER, & CO., 15 WATERLOO PLACE 1883 [All rights reserved] CONTENTS OB THE FIRST VOLUAIE. CHAPTEE PAGE I. FRIENDSHIP 1 II. MRS. STANNIFORTH S NEIGHBOURS . ... 36 J III. DISTRUST 59 IV. THE RISING AND THE SETTING SUN ... 83 V. THE YOUNG GENERATION 108 VI. THE WANDERER'S RETURN . . . . .131 VII. COLONEL KENYON LOOKS ON 153 VIII. COOMASSIE VILLA 178 II. MISS BRUNE'S PARTNER 205 X. MR. STANNIFORTH MAKES FRIENDS . . .231 XI. COLONEL KENYON GOES TO CHURCH . . . . 255 XII. PHILIP EXEMPLIFIES A THEORY . . . .282

Chapter I. Friendship

It is now close upon three thousand years since an old kins: in Jerusalem sat down in some weariness and bitterness of spirit to record his conviction that nothing new was discoverable by human wisdom : ' The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be ; and that which is done is that Avhich shall be done ; and there is no new thina: under the sun.' A later and less famous philosopher has added to this that there is nothing true, together with the comfortable conclusion that ' it don't signify.' To such extreme lengths not many of us will be pre pared to go ; but it will be agreed on all hands that our common mortal nature remains much the same to-day as it was in King Solomon's time. Xoav, as then, gardens and orchards, men-singers and women-singers, gold and silver, VOL. I. B and all the delights of the sons of men can bestow nothing but satiety ; noAv, as then, the experience of all the past generations is of very little service to the passing one ; now, as then, the wise man's eyes are in his head, while the fool walketh in darkness, and one event hap peneth to them all ; very much the same vices and virtues flourish, and meet with very much the same degree of recognition.

And so, when a small novelist of the nineteenth century takes up his pen to describe, within the limits of his small capacity, that infinitesimal section of humanity which has come under his oaaoi observation, no one, surely — except a very unreasonable person — will expect his work to be novel in anything save the name. The following story, then, will professedly contain nothing new. The personages who are to figure in it will be, without exception, unremarkable personages. There avUI be good and bad folks among them ; but none of these will be very good or very bad, and the events of their several and joint lives will not be half so startling as many that may be read of in the newspapers every day. It is to be hoped, hoAvever, that readers will not allow themselves to be discouraged by the candour of this preliminary confession, but Avill plod cheerfully on ; and who knoAvs but that, FRIENDSHIP. before they reach the last words of the last chapter, they may light upon something that will be at any rate new to them ? — seeing that they wiU not be all of them Solomons.

For, although there be nothing new in the planet which we inhabit, it by no means follows that phenomena calculated to fill us Avith the most profound astonishment are not daily occurring upon its surface. Are we not invariably aston ished by some proof that our fellow-creatures are made of the same clay as ourselves ? Does not ingratitude, for instance, shock to the full as much as it angers us, especially Avhen we suffer personally in consequence of it? When we are brought face to face with selfishness, baseness, infidelity, are we not usually as much surprised at the sorry spectacle as if such failings had never been heard of before, and as if we ourselves were wholly exempt from them? Does any man understand how his neighbour can be so utterly stupid as to fall a victim to self-deception?

All these qualities, and their opposites, will appear incidentally in the course of the ensuing pages; so that the fault will lie with the writer, not with the subject, if no interest is felt in the persons treated of; the first of whom shall, without further waste of words, be introduced upon the scene as he hurries along the platform B of the Charing Cross station on a bright summer's morning. ' Guard,' says he, ' I want a smokingcarriage.' ' Very good, sir.' ' And — here you are, guard.' ' Thank you, sir.' ' Just lock the door, will you, till Ave're off ? I don't want anybody else in here.' ' I'll do the best I can, sir,' says the func tionary, making use of the time-honoured formula of his genus; and apparently his efforts to earn five shillings in defiance of the Com pany's regulations are crowned with the success which honest labour merits, for presently the train glides out of the station with but one occupant of the carriage in question.

The passenger who had displayed so great a love of privacy as to require an entire smoking compartment for his ow*n use lit a cigar, sighed heavily once or twice, and dropped into a brown study, which, judging by the frown on his brow and the worried expression of his face, must have had some intricate and perplexing matter for its starting-point. He was a tall, thin man, whom some people might have called fine-looking, but whom no one, probably, would have considered handsome. He had a pair of pleasant brown eyes, a nose which was decidedly too large for FRIENDSHIP. 5 beauty, and his mouth was concealed by a long moustache, which he tAvisted and tugged in the course of his meditations. He had in no way the appearance of a young man, although his age at this time could hardly have exceeded three-and -thirty.

Some men, as the casual observer has doubtless noticed, preserve the ways and the air of youth up to the confines of middle age ; while others — and these are perhaps the majority — pass through a transition period which is neither the one thina; nor the other. Our solitary passenger was of the latter class. The casual observer would scarcely have found any thing sufficiently striking about him to excite curious speculations as to his identity ; but no observer, hoAvever casual, could have felt one instant's doubt as to what was his caUing in life. He was a soldier from the crovA'ii of his closely cropped head to the tips of his well-blacked boots ; and observers with an eye for detail might even have formed a tolerably confident guess at the branch of the service to which he belonged. Had he been an officer of infantry be would not have had a clearly-defined diagonal line across his forehead, separating a corner of white skin from a larger expanse of red-brown ; a hussar or a lancer would have been more fashionably, and a plunger more loudly, dressed.

There remain the tAvo scientific corps ; and some trifling points about this gentleman, such as his attitude, as he sat slightly sideways, his right leg tucked under the seat and his left stretched out stiffly before him, seemed to harmonise with the addresses upon a packet of letters which he presently drew from his pocket — ' Captain Ken yon, R.H.A., Aldershot.' He had read his letters before, for the envelopes were all torn open; but possibly be may have desired to refresh his memory by reading them again. He ran through the first two or three briskly enough ; they had a legal aspect, and evidently related to matters of business. But over the last he lingered for a long time, often referring back to words already perused, breaking off every now and again to gaze abstractedly out of the window, smiling faintly sometimes, yet sighing even whUe he smiled, and maintaining always the puzzled and anxious expression of one who has got into a situation of Avhich the full significance is not yet clear to him.

This letter was w*ritten in a woman's firm, flowing hand, upon paper with a broad black border, and ran as follows : — 'Longbourne, 18th August. ' Mr dear Hugh, — I ought to have written before this to thank you for the kind letter which you sent me four months ago ; but I am sure that FRIENDSHIP. I need not really apologise, and that youAvill know that I did not value your sympathy the less be cause I could not acknowledge it just at once. If I could have written to anybody, it would have been to you. Now I am quite able to write, and to talk to you too ; and you need not have any scruple about discussing the business matters which you say we must go into, because I want to hear about them, and to knQAv what my duties are, and where I am to begin, and all the rest. ' And I do very much long to see you.

The others mean to be kind, but they don't under stand ; and of course they cannot, never having had to suffer in quite the same way that I do. It is only you who have the secret of putting yourself in everybody's place, and knowing things that you have never been told, and could not have been told. Do you remember how poor old nurse used to say, " There's not a man or woman in Crayminster as can hold a candle to 'Ugh " ? And then the person whom she was addressing would simper, and look down with an air of modest deprecation, till she explained, '' Bless your soul, I don't mean you ! I mean 'Ugh Kenyon." I reminded them of it yesterday, when we were talking of your coming down ; and I think they were a little shocked at my laughing. They think I ought not to be able to laugh, and at the same time they talk of the necessity of my " rousing my self," and are in a terrible fright lest I should " shut myself up and mope."

My father reminds me that I have many duties and responsibilities to face, and a career of great usefulness open to me ; and Mr. Langley warns me to beAvare of the temptation of a selfish sorrow, and he is convinced that I should be better in mind and body if I Avent to confession. I don't think I will go to confession ; but of course I should like to be of use to others, if I can, and I do wish and intend to put my wretched self out of sight, and let my neighbours suppose that I have " got over " my trouble, as everyone is expected to do after a time. But, oh! dear old Hugh, you know, if nobody else does, that that is quite an impossibility, and that neither four months, nor four years, nor any number of years can make the smallest difference. It won't be the same Margaret whom you used to chase round the Precincts when she was a child, and whom you used to dance with at the county balls when she was a gawky girl — it Avon't be that Margaret who will meet you to-morrow, but another person altogether, who has somehow got into her skin, and would give anything to be out of it.

I died when Jack died : that was the end of my happiness and the end of my life. Only someone, who is I, and yet not I, has got to live many FRIENDSHIP. years longer in a world which is the old world, and yet is a totally new one ; for, like auld Robin Gray's wife, "I'm no like to dee." And so it is all bewilderment and a puzzle ; and I think, if anyone can give the clue to it, it will be you. You remember hoAv I used to run to you in all my little troubles in the old days ; you Avere always my best friend. And then you were Jack's best friend too. I have got a few things of his to give you — his gun, and a trout-rod, and some other things. I don't know Avhether they are good of their kind ; but I thought you would like to have them, so I set them aside for you. It has been such a comfort to me that he made you his executor.

Old Mr. Stanniforth has written to me ; but he seemed to think you would tell me all that it aa„s necessary for me to know — and I would very much rather have it so. I can't tell you what a relief it will be to me to be able to talk to someone just as I feel. 'I should never have ventured to inflict all this rambling egotism upon anyone but you, and perhaps, after now, I AA'on't make even that exception ; but I know you will forgive it for this once. I have a great deal to tell you and ask you about ; but it will be better said than written. ' Ever your affectionate friend, ' Margaret Stanniforth.' NO new thing. ' A comfort to her that Jack made me his executor ! ' muttered Captain Kenyon, as he restored this letter to his pocket, after having perused it often enough to have learnt its con tents by heart. ' I hope it may be a comfort to her, poor thing !

I hope so, I'm sure, with aU my heart. It ain't much of a comfort to me, I know.' He sighed, re -lighted his cigar, which had gone out, and shifted his place from one side of the carriage to the other and then back again. ' Not that I grudge the trouble, mind you,' be added, apologetically addressing an imaginary hearer, ' nor the — the — aAvkwardness of it ; it isn't that. But— — •' He did not finish the sentence, but presently resumed, in a more decided and cheerful voice, ' Well, Lord knows how it wUl all end ! but for the present my duty is clear and simple enough ; there's some con solation in that.' So he gave his broad shoulders a shake, as though mental burdens could be cast off after that easy fashion, and, turning to the window, looked out at the woods and hills and pastures of the pleasant county where he had been born and bred, and through which the train was now rushing.

It was a year since he had last gazed at those familiar scenes and landmarks. Barely twelve months before he had travelled down FRIENDSHIP. from Aldershot, on just such a sunny summer's morning, to be present at a gay wedding in Crayminster Cathedral. It had been his pleasing duty to act as best man on that occasion, and the bridegroom had been his old friend, Jack Stanniforth, and the bride his stiU older friend Margaret Winnington, the daughter of the Bishop. The ceremony had been a grand and largely attended one, and had created no small stir in the county, where Mrs. Winnington, whose eldest daughter had recently been led to the altar by no less a personage than Lord Travers, enjoyed that mixture of respect, envy, and detraction Avhich commonly falls to the lot of mothers who marry their daughters well.

Jack Stanniforth, to be sure, was hardly so big a fish as Lord Travers, being not only uncon nected with the aristocracy, but devoid, to aU intents and purposes, of so much as an authentic grandfather. But then, as everybody remarked, Kate had been a beauty, whereas Margaret was really almost what you might call a plain girl, and the riches of the Stanniforths were under stood to be boundless. Big fish or little fish, Jack had, as a matter of fact, been landed by no skill on the part of his future mother-in-law, but simply by his own goodwill and pleasure. He had been brought down into those waters by Hugh Kenyon, who NO NEAV THING. was thus responsible, if anyone Avas, for his subsequent capture ; and it Avas therefore only right and proper that Hugh should have been present, in his best blue frock-coat and with a sprig of stephanotis in his buttonhole, to stand behind the bridegroom on the auspicious day.

Of old Mr. Stanniforth, the wealthy Man chester merchant, who dwelt in a palace near the city in Avhich he had made his fortune, and who rarely stirred beyond his OAvn park gates, Crayminster kneAV nothing and London very little; but his two sons had the privilege of a large acquaintance in the metropolis and beyond it, and were as popular as rich, well-mannered, and modest men are sure to be. Tom, the elder, had for some time sat as one of the members for a large manufacturing borough ; Jack, the younger, had entered a smart hussar regiment, and had disported himself therein, during the early years of his youth, to the satisfaction of himself and his brother-officers, and to the intense admiration of the opposite sex, until he had added to all his other charms the crownin_ one of inheriting unexpectedly a large fortune by the death of a maternal uncle.

Upon this he had sent in his papers ; and almost immediately afterwards, having happened to go down to Crayminster with his friend Kenyon, had seen Margaret, had fallen in love with her, and, after FRIENDSHIP. 13 a very brief courtship, had proposed and been accepted. Little as Captain Kenyon had foreseen such a result of his introduction of the ex-hussar to the Bishop's family, his share in bringing it about was not the less gratefully and magnanimously acknowledged by Mrs. Winnington. ' Dear Hugh,' she had said, in her most benign manner, ' I shall never forget, and I am sure Margaret will never forget, that her happiness has come to her through you.' And this compliment should have been the more agreeable to its recipient, inasmuch as Mrs. AVinnington had not always been used to address him in so friendly a tone.

Of course — as she would often explain to her intimates — she was devoted to dear old Hugh, and during the lifetime of his uncle the Dean, he had almost lived in the house, and had been quite like a son to herself and an elder brother to her daughters ; but now that Kate and Margaret were growing up, one really had to be a little more careful ; because people would talk, and there was no saying what preposterous no tions men might not get into their heads if proper precautions were not taken to nip such notions in the bud. There had, therefore, been occasions upon which a sense of duty had led Mrs. Winnington to turn the cold shoulder to her dear old Hugh, and to point out to him with somewhat unnecessary emphasis how great was the disparity of years been him and the young ladies to Avhom he had been ' quite like an elder brother.' Now a glance at Hart's Army List would have disclosed the fact that Jack Stanniforth was only Captain Kenyon's junior by a year; but, as has been already remarked, some men are young up to the verge of middle age, while others have ceased to be so before they are out of the twenties ; and Jack certainly belonged to the former and Hugh to the latter category.

He had, indeed, been so long accustomed to hearing himself addressed as ' old Hugh ' that he had ended by accepting the adjective in its literal sense and acquiescing in its propriety ; nor had he failed to join in the laughter which arose from all sides when the bridegroom, in return ing thanks at the w*edding-breakfast, had ex pressed a hope that his best man would soon follow bis bright example. Old Hugh was so evidently a predestined old bachelor. Immediately after the wedding the young couple had started for Switzerland and Italy, upon a tour which was prolonged far beyond the limits of ordinary honeymoons, the excuse for their protracted absence being that their new home could not possibly be made ready to receive them in less than six months at earliest. This new home was that fine old place Long- FRIENDSHIP. bourne, near Crayminster, for many generations the residence of the Brune family.

It had come into the market some years previously, owing to the necessitous circumstances of the owner, and had found a purchaser in Mr. Stanniforth of Manchester. What could have been Mr. Stanniforth's object in acquiring an estate which he had scarcely seen and shoAved no disposition to occupy was a puzzle to everybody, until the construction of the Crayminster and Craybridge branch line, which cut through an angle of the property, with satisfactory results to the pocket of its new owner, seemed to throw some light upon the mystery. Noav, the old gentleman, in an easy and princely fashion, had offered Longbourne as a wedding gift to his second son, stipulating only that he should be aUowed to put the place in order before the bride and bridegroom took possession of it. They, for their part, were nothing loth to consent to an arrangement which promised them a somewhat longer holiday under southern skies ; and so architects and artists, landscape-gardeners, stone masons, and upholsterers, had come down from London in a small army, and had busied them selves throughout the winter in beautifying the house and grounds, which were destined never to be enjoyed by those for whose sake aU this ex pense and trouble had been incurred.

For, one afternoon, Jack Stanniforth, a strong man, who had scarcely known what illness was in the course of his merr}' life, rode back to Rome feeling tired and chilled after hunting on the Campagna ; and the next day he took to his bed ; and before the Aveek Avas out he Avas dead and buried. Under the shock of this sudden and terrible calamity the young Avidow had fallen into a sort of stupor, Avhich at first caused considerable alarm both to her friends and to her medical advisers. The latter had enjoined absolute rest, change of scene, a bracing atmosphere, and what not — since doctors, when they are called in, must needs enjoin something — and Mrs.' Winnington had hastened out to Italy, and had taken her daughter, passive and indifferent, to the Engadine. After a time Margaret had rallied, had returned, by her own desire, to England, and had taken up her residence at Longbourne, Avhere it now became necessary that Hugh Kenyon should seek her out, in order to explain to her the provisions of her husband's will, under which he and the dead man's father had been appointed executors and trustees.

Such was the condensed tragedy of Avhich the details passed quickly through Captain Kenyon's mind, as he sat looking out of the raihvay carriage window. And as he remembered it all, FRIENDSHIP. 17 and how, only the other day, he had travelled over the same ground on his way dovvm to the AA*edding, and how, but a few months before that, Margaret had not even seen the man who was to be her husband, he could not help saying to him self that it was impossible that so brief an episode — however terrible it might be — should cast a permanent gloom over a young life. ' It isn't the same thing,' he mused, ' it can't be the same thin£, as loshi"; a husband or a wife after twenty years of married life. That would be like having an arm or a leg cut off — there would be something gone from one which one could never forget nor replace.

But this — well, this is more like having a tooth out; a wrench and a howl, and all's over.' Then, repenting of having used so homely a metaphor, even in thought, he muttered sadly, ' Poor Jack— poor old feUow ! ' Presently the train drew up in Crayminster station, and a groom in mourning livery came to the door and touched his hat. The dog-cart was waiting outside, he 6aid, and was there any luggage, please ? No ; Kenyon answered, there was no luggage ; he was going back that same evening. He climbed into the dog-cart, but declined to take the reins. With an odd sort of pang and feeling of compunction, he had recognised the cart as one that Jack used to drive, and VOL. I. c the horse as one of his friend's old hunters. As the vehicle clattered through the narrow streets ofthe old town, more than one pedestrian nodded and waved his hand to its occupant ; but Hugh, avIio kept his eyes obstinately fixed upon his boots, saw none of these friendly signals.

He knew that by no possibility could he traverse Crayminster on any day of the week Avithout encountering at least a dozen acquaintances ; and he was afraid of being stopped aud questioned. Therefore he would not look up, and was relieved when he had left the town behind him and was well out into the open country. Half an hour's driA'e, at first across broad water-meadows and then through woods and up a long gradual incline, brought him to the lodge gates of Longbourne — neAv gates and a new lodge, as Hugh observed. He had known the place well in the late Mr. Brune's time, and was prepared to find it altered, not altogether for the better, by the touch of the Manchester mil lionaire. It appeared, however, that Mr. Stan niforth's taste, or the taste of those employed by him, had been better than Hugh had antici pated ; for the alterations were not conspicuous, and such as there were were of a kind to which exception could not be taken.

In the undu lating park and in the long avenue of lime-trees which was the pride of Longbourne there Avas FRIENDSHIP. no room for change ; only the gardens had been extended and improved ; new lawns and terraces had been laid out, and briUiant masses and rib bons of colour replaced the scanty and ill-tended flower-beds of former years. The house itself, a red-brick structure, which, like most country houses of its date, was said to have been built after designs of Inigo Jones, shoAved no traces of interference, except in so far as that its white stone facings had been reneAved or cleaned ; no plate-glass had superseded the many panes of the lars;e oblong windows, nor was the lona; flat facade disfigured by any modern bows or bays. But when once the hall-door was passed, Hugh found himself upon totally unknown ground.

Under the Brune regime the furniture of the mansion had been meagre and its servants few; now there was perhaps rather a superabundance of both. The entrance-hall was embellished with antlers, with old carved-oak chests and cabinets, with huge vases of Oriental china and with arm-chairs in stamped leather. The drawing-room, into which Hugh was ushered, had been despoiled of its tarnished gilding, its brocade and three-pile Axminster; and in lieu of these departed glories was a more sober style of decoration ; subdued colouring ; a few paintings by old Dutch masters ; chairs, sofas, and tables more valuable than resplendent. c NO NEAV THING. Everything was perfectly correct — a little too correct, Hugh thought ; for at the time with which we are concerned correctness of uphol stery had not yet become the chief aim and ob ject of the British householder.

The place looked a trifle cold and stiff and uninhabited ; and over the whole establishment there brooded the solemn hush of wealth. While Captain Kenyon was proceeding with his unspoken criticisms the door opened, and a tall, slim woman, dressed in widow's weeds, entered, and held out her hand to him saying, ' How do you do, Hugh ? ' in a low, quiet voice. Though he could hardly have been unprepared for the appearance of this lady, he started as violently as if he had seen a ghost, and, finding not a word to say, grasped her hand silently, while he looked into her face with an eager, questioning gaze. The face that he scanned so anxiously was not beautiful, nor even pretty. For one thing, it was extremely pale, with that grey pallor which comes only from illness or suffering; and, as is often the case with fair-complexioned women, the colourlessness was not confined to the cheeks, but seemed to have extended to the hair and eyes, the former of which ought to have been, but was not, golden, while the latter ought to have been, but were not, blue.

An FRIENDSHIP. 21 old-fashioned passport would probably have summed up the remaining features tersely with ' forehead high, nose ordinary, mouth rather large.' It was, however, an honest, trust worthy, and kind face — a face which all dogs and children, and some discriminating adults, understood and loved at the first glance. Mar garet Stanniforth had never been accounted a beauty, yet she had never lacked admirers ; and, when in the glow of youth and health, she might even haA*e passed for a pretty girl, had she not happened to be the plain one of a family somewhat notorious for good looks. For the rest, she had a good figure ; she carried her head well, as all the Winningtons do, and she had, as they all haATe, a certain undefinable grace and air of good breeding. The sight of her in those deep mourning robes almost unmanned the soft-hearted Hugh ; and, instead of one of the brisk little cheerful speeches which he had rehearsed on his way from the station, he blurted out something awkward and incoherent, at last, about never having thought he should meet her again like this ; but she had the quiet ease of manner which belongs to unselfish people, and she gave him time to recover himself by talking about the proposed restoration of the cathedral, and her father's speech in the House of Lords, and other matters NO NEW THING. which could be treated of without danger of disturbance to anyone's equanimity. ' Are you all alone here ? ' Hugh asked at length. ' I am now.