Claude

Chapter I

HERE were only three of us at the old home when my father died—I mean of

us young ones. Not that I was so very young either at that time, though I was the youngest of the first family. I did not remember my own mother, for she died a year after I was born, and in another year my father married again. My step-mother, Mrs. Markham, was the only one I had ever known as my father’s wife, and as filling the place of mother to myself. I do not think she filled it much to her own satisfaction or mine either, for, though there were not much more than a couple of

VOI B years between me and her eldest-born, Claude, she always made a difference between us that seemed to remind every one that one was the real, the other only the pretended child of her heart. My brother Piers was the eldest of our family, and, as I have said, I, Marian, was the youngest of the six little children left to deplore a mother’s loss.

Perhaps it was not wonderful that my father felt the want of a lady in his household to look after his family and domestic affairs; and hence came the hasty wedding with Lord Ramsay’s rather plain daughter.

The Honourable Charlotte Ramsay was neither young nor pretty when she listened to the recently-widowed Mr. Markham’s proposal to become his wife. It was _ probably the first offer of the kind she had ever received, and possibly fearing it might be the last, she eagerly accepted it, and in a short time after became my father’s wife.

We were an old Yorkshire family, with a long pedigree, but of no considerable fortune, though independent and well off in the world. When I say that, it may be understood that our social position in that aristocratic county was not amongst its magnates. We had, however, a good and respectable acquaintance in our own immediate neighbourhood, and were well-esteemed there; but we had little to do with the great world beyond. What strange ambition, therefore, prompted my poor father when he first thought of Lord Ramsay's daughter as his second wife I cannot tell. I have heard it hinted that the idea of their marriage originated with the lady; and that being the case, the problem is easily solved. Lord Ramsay’s peerage, too, dated but a few years back, himself only being a law lord, and the first of the creation. It was, therefore, a very barren honour that the alliance conferred on the old Markham family. Still it was not without certain results, which were rather unfavourable than otherwise to its well-being. It seemed that the very questionable savour of aristocracy imported into

Bod, the family by my father’s new wife appeared of far more consequence in that lady’s estimation than in that of any other person. It made her very exacting in all matters of expenditure, and very tenacious of what she considered due to herself and her own children, as small far-off scions of nobility.

The Honourable Mrs. Markham came to her new abode after her marriage with a very firm determination to hold her own tbere, and lead a very different sort of life from that which had contented my gentle mother for the dozen or so years of her happy, blameless wedded lites

I should perhaps mention a fact here, often alluded to by my step-mother, that the first Mrs. Markham, being only the daughter of a poor curate, was, she declared, no judge of what was befitting the higher sphere of life into which my father’s love had removed her, but brought with her to the old Manor-house most of the simple ways and unostentatious habits that had sufficed her girlish life. I believe her husband loved her and her ways too well to wish to alter either in any respect. But it is certain, if he had desired an entire change in his domestic life, he found it after he had married his second wife. Happily, my father was an easy-tempered man, and more disposed to evade trouble than encounter it or fight it down. He was handsome in person, open-hearted in disposition, and, Yorkshireman though he was, unsuspicious of evil design in others. He would sooner conciliate an enemy than retaliate upon him; he was nevertheless brave as the day, and so tenderly careful of wounding a woman’s feelings, that, let her conduct and requests be ever so unreasonble, he would find excuses for, and seek the means of gratifying them.

This little statement is given in explanation of the manner in which the second Mrs. Markham contrived to govern my father, and exercise such an unfortunate influence over his affairs. I do not know that there was any real evil in her disposition, or that she was fully aware of the mischief that was actually done to his family and fortune. She was a vain and somewhat foolish woman, pleased with having achieved the dignity of wifehood at last, and proud of being the mother of two children, the elder of whom was remarkably handsome. She was not disposed, however, to forego any present gratification with a view to their future benefit in life, though the neelected their interest in this way, and seriously injured my father’s fortune and his children by her extravagance and self-indulgence —not, as I have said, with “ malice prepense,” but from a recklessness that ignored the rights of others, and cared for nothing, except as it ministered to her own advantage or pleasure.

Of course I was no judge of what I have advanced in the early years of my father’s second marriage, nor could I for very many years after conceive why so great a difference should be made between those two younger children and the six others that had preceded them. Ido not even know whether my father was cognizant of all that was going on in that way in his own house, for there was much that was unpleasant, and yet of too impalpable a character to be accurately defined. At all events, he never took any active part on his children’s behalf; or if he ever did (though the results might be favourable to us), we were quite unaware when or in what way the movement had been made.

Mrs. Markham’s lavish expenditure of my father’s comfortable though by no means large fortune was another point in which no remonstrance, it seems, had any effect. She took every advantage of her husband’s generous nature, and pleaded her own habits of luxurious expense in her father’s aristocratic establishment as an excuse for her nonconformity with the more homely arrangements of the Manor-house household. This plea generally silenced my father, for he naturally desired to avoid the imputation of subjecting his wife to what she considered a parsimonious and niggardly style of living, as contrasted with what she had been used to.

Thus it was that in his over-indulgent liberality to a vain, silly, ostentatious woman, his affairs, hitherto so well conducted and so amply sufficing to all his wants, became entangled in a hopeless web of yearly-increasing difficulty. All this did not become fully apparent. till my father’s rather sudden death brought many things to light that would otherwise no doubt have remained long concealed, or at best but partially known.

No words can express the loss—the bitter, irretrievable loss my father’s death was to his family. As I have said, we were but three in number at that time. My brother Piers had left us for India many years before, and of the four intervening children between him and me none remained—they had all died; so he and I alone remained of the first family, with our dozen years of separation between us.

I remembered very little of Piers, for he had left us when he was barely twenty, and I

CLAUDE. g consequently but eight years old. Still I was dearly attached to such recollections as I had preserved of my only brother. That remembrance was constantly refreshed by letters addressed to his little sister, and presents of far more value than I could appreciate at that time. Piers had left home in rather a rebellious state of mind, I fear. He could not bring himself to love, or even like, his step-mother, although he was but a boy of twelve at the time of his father’s second marriage. Neither did Mrs. Markham love her step-son, or care to make any pretence that she did so. I fancy Piers was not a very attaching youth to those he cared little for; neither was he good-looking in those early days. He was tall and strong, and resolute-looking enough, I have been told, but had little of the graceful beauty which distinguished his younger brother Claude. As far as so selfish a woman as Mrs. Markham could care for any one, she loved her handsome sane her only other child, a daughter, grew up far less pretty than the promise of her youthful days had given room to expect.

Juliet, in spite of her early childish beauty and her pretty name, was a quiet, commonplace-looking fair girl at seventeen, her age at the time we lost our mutual friend and father.

Mrs. Markham’s maternal affection had cooled in great measure as Juliet grew up so much plainer than she had predicted; and what there was of affection in her nature she lavished on her handsome son Claude.

I was at that time twenty-two years of age, and felt so much older than my halfsister, that I bestowed on her some of the motherly regard that was wanting for her in other quarters. Claude was at that time nearly one-and-twenty; and the absent Piers was then full five-and-thirty. He seemed to us younger ones quite a middle-aged man, and well-fitted to fill the responsible office as head of our bereaved household. He was, as I have said, in India at the time our great calamity befell us. He was not in the Army, but in

CLAUDE. ial the Civil Service there, and had for some time held a very lucrative situation; we had all believed he would remain there till he came home an old man, and a rich nabob. We did not very well know what that might mean, but we were all inclined to look upon Piers as a man whose future wealth and importance would amply atone for all the inroads which family extravagance might have made in the hereditary property.

My. father’s death took place in London, where it was Mrs. Markham’s pleasure to drag her reluctant husband year by year, when funds could be raised to meet the heavy expenses attendant on the move. Whilst Mrs. Markham’s father lived (which was but a short time after their marriage), his house ‘was open for a certain time to them. After Lord Ramsay’s death, the habit of going there was continued, at a great sacrifice of money and comfort to my father, who cared nothing for fashionable society, and passed his time in town, amongst a few old friends and such neighbours as might be met at that season. Still he was too loyal and kind a husband not to accompany his wife to London, or morosely to interfere with her enjoyments when there.

This had gone on for the two-and-twenty years of their married life with little alteration. Sometimes my father had made a feeble protest against their leaving their family so many weeks, sometimes months, alone; and had latterly ventured to suggest that I was surely of an age to accompany them to London, and share in such pleasures and advantages as might be derived from the life Mrs. Markham loved to lead there.

She had an unanswerable argument in reply, to negative this proposition. First, the immense increase of expense it would involve; and secondly, that as she chiefly visited amongst her own family and friends, she could hardly expect them to encumber themselves with a raw country girl, such as she was pleased to call me; and so I remained quietly at home, looking after my sister Juliet, and amusing myself in the best way otherwise that I could.

Meanwhile our younger brother Claude had been sent, regardless of expense, both to Eton and to Oxford; and it was at the latter place he received the tidings of our great family bereavement. His mother had insisted on the necessity of her son going to Eton, on account of the acquaintances he might make there; and expatiated much on the many advantages that would accrue to him from being brought up there. But it seemed to me the learning part of his education was the last thing she thought about in the choice of a school for her son. Mrs. Markham and even my father were well satisfied to see him as gentlemanlike in his manner as he was handsome in person; whether his mind was as well cultivated, remained for time to prove.

Chapter II

HE old home would have been rather dull— what with the frequent absences of our father and his wife, and both our brothers away—had it not been for our nearest neighbours. These consisted of the family of Mr. Crofton, at the Hall of the same name, about three miles distant, and that of my grandfather, comprising himself and grandson, Luke Dillon. Parson Dillon, as he was generally denominated, had long been the incumbent of our parish. He was but the Curate at the time my father married his daughter; but a few years after, the Rector dying, the living had been given to him by the father of our other neighbour, Mr. Crofton.

This Mr Crofton owned most of the land about

CLAUDE. lies us, my father’s small estate not counting above fifteen hundred acres in all—and many of these had in late years become mortgaged to our greater and more wealthy neighbour.

There was a sorrowful history attached to this Mr. Crofton’s antecedents. It is one I do not care to enter very fully upon, nor is it necessary for the progress of my story. It will be enough to say that Mr. Crofton married early in life; his wife was a very beautiful girl, whom he passionately loved. At the time of his marriage he was in the Army, and his elder brother and father being then alive, he did not give up his profession, but travelled about with his regiment, his wife being with him. In the first year of his marriage his only child was born, a daughter—called after her mother Florence, but whom we in later years knew only as Flora Crofton. Keene Crofton was very happy for the first seven years of his marriage, and then came a dreadful blight upon his future life and prospects. His wife, so lovely and beloved, deceived and deserted him.

Soon after that wretched event both his father and elder brother died within the space of a year, and Mr. Crofton succeeded to the fortune and family estates. He was only thirty at that time, and little Flora was but seven years old. It was just ten years, at the time of my father’s death, since Keene Crofton came into our neighbourhood and took up his abode at the old family place, Crofton Hall.

Being but a child of thirteen at that time, I only heard mysterious whispers concerning our new neighbour at the Hall. I remember very well the look of awe with which I gazed furtively on the dark, handsome, but most unhappy looking man who made his weekly appearance in the Hall pew at our parish church, with his pretty little girl and a very pleasing looking lady somewhat younger than himself, who we soon heard was his sister. None of the family had lived at the old Hall for many years —they came therefore as strangers amongst us. Indeed it was on that account that Mr. Crofton had decided to live at the place. The Croftons

CLAUDE. Ig owned another and finer estate in the South of England, and there old Mr. Crofton had lived and died. When Keene Crofton had elected to take up his abode in our wild and thinly inhabited country he had just passed through the terrible ordeal of a public trial, by which he was released from the ties which bound him to a faithless wife, but which seemed, at the same time, to have severed all the interests which had bound him to society. He felt his position deeply and acutely, and was a disappointed, moody, wretched man.

Ten years had passed away since that time; his faithless wife was dead ; but it appeared he had conceived an intense distrust of all womankind in consequence of her wretched lapse; he had loved and trusted her so entirely. And to add to the misery of the whole affair, the man who had betrayed him was not only a fellow-oflicer, but particular friend of his own.

Hence it came to pass, that Keene Crofton felt himself, as it were, placed in antagonism with every man, as well as woman, in the

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world, for all time to come. I believe he made some exception to his sister Mary, who accompanied him into his retirement with his little girl, She had been on the point of marriage herself at the time, but had postponed all her happier prospects, to go into exile, as 1t seemed, for a time with her brother, till he became more reconciled to his position. Jn consequence of this delay on Miss Crofton’s part, misunderstandings arose between her and her lover; and these increased so unhappily, that in the course of another year he revenged himself on his promised bride, and no doubt on himself also, by marrying another wife. So poor Mary Crofton was in her turn deceived and deserted too. Though the cases were by no means parallel, they were sufficiently similar in their results to draw the brother and sister more closely together, with bands of no common strength of sympathy and attachment. Thus Mary Crofton had remained for ten years the mistress of her brother's house, and her faithless lover, Sir Edward Mainwaring, ‘had

OLAUDE. 19 been married nearly as many, and both had apparently resigned themselves to their early disappointment, and found fresh objects of love and interest.

For the first year or two after the Croftons came to the Hall they steadily resisted every effort made by their two nearest neighbours, my father and grandfather, who wished to tempt the moody man into more friendly relations, whilst they felt a compassionate interest in the sister and little girl, who were also so entirely secluded. At the end of the third year an accidental circumstance occurred which brought the two families together at last.

My father happened to meet Miss Crofton and her little niece out walking, and rescue them from some peril they were exposed to from a drove of wild cattle on the moors; and as he himself ran considerable risk in the affair, it made the first opening towards kindly and neighbourly feeling between the two families.

I think Mary Crofton must have hailed the prospect of renewed intercourse with a few of

C2 her fellow-creatures, for, in spite of her unhappy love story, she was not a woman to pass all her days lamenting. She had no doubt felt her lover’s desertion accutely, but the same brave, unselfish spirit, which had made her cling to her brother in his misery, upheld her also when her own prospects became clouded over. She believed her life was given her for other purposes than wearing herself out in vain and useless repining, and refusing to be made happy in any way except that which was denied her. It was strange, perhaps, and rather touching to see that, although so resolute and self-sacrificmg in her own case, she was tenderly indulgent towards her brother’s frame of mind and habit of morbid despondency. She always seemed to think her own sorrows so ight when compared with his, they were hardly worthy of consideration. In fact, after the first wrench, and after she had heard of Sir Edward Mainwaring’s actual marriage, she thought of herself and her individual troubles very little at all.

CLAUDE. Pil

In time our two families became as intimate as the near neighbourhood, and otherwise solitary surroundings, seemed to demand. Mr. Crofton’s despairing grief and angry retrospections faded away at last under the calming influence of time and the daily interest of passing events. It must be so, however tenacious humanity may be of its own sorrows, so all-important to the sufferer, for nature cannot retain the same vivid impression as in the early days of trial. Time will in all cases do its work of partial obliteration. No doubt there is often a certain habit of mind formed in those periods of trial which survives the poignancy of the grief, and, be it for good or evil, exerts an influence over the remaining years of life.

Thus Mr. Crofton’s mind, as I have told, emerged from its baptism of suffering, changed and altered in many respects. He was no longer overwhelmed with vain regrets, and vainer grief, but those griefs had stamped their indelible traces on his character and disposition, and it was thus altered, and, I may add, in some degree deteriorated from its original nature, when we first became acquainted with him, his sister, and little gil. It was difficult to tell whether he really loved the child much, or not. She was extremely pretty, and always remained so. Indeed, hers was a style of beauty that increased and_became more perfect as she grew older. The Croftons were all dark. Mary was a sparkling brunette once, but she became much paler, after her early bloom had passed away.

Flora resembled her beautiful mother, I was told, in the delicacy of her features and complexion, and the golden hue of her luxuriant hair; but she differed from her in inheriting the dark eyes and brows of her father and his family, and this circumstance gave a peculiar charm and character to her beauty.

At the time when the Croftons first came amongst us, they made a slight acquaintance, as though in duty bound, with the clergyman’s (my grandfather’s) family ; and he, who was the kindest and simplest of human beings, with Aunt Alice (then living), who was like him in every respect, did his utmost to fan the little spark of toleration into a more genial flame of cordiality. For some time it was all in vain; though the good parson and _ his daughter lived in hopes of more friendly and neighbourly intercourse with the Croftons, neither brother nor sister seemed to care to break the spell which held them aloof.

Mary no doubt acted solely in compliance with her brother’s wishes, totally suppressing any desires she might have had herself on the subject. At last, as I have said, the ice was broken, and the Markhams were at length recognized and acknowledged as friends and neighbours by them, as well as Mr. Dillon and his daughter.

Every one was well inclined to make all due allowances for Mr. Crofton’s peculiar position, and consequent soreness of mind. Thus it was he became from the first a sort of privileged person amongst us; not in any way owing to

24 OLAUDE.

the superiority of his possessions, but to the consideration of past suffering which had been so peculiarly his portion.

And yet I may be wrong in saying this, as regarded the whole of my father’s household, for I think Mrs. Markham did _ tolerate and excuse all shortcomings of respect and civility on the part of her neighbour, more because he was a man whose family and position stood high in the great world without, and he himself was known to be rich, and could have been great also, had he so wished it, than because he was the victim of a great domestic sorrow, and was weighed down by an almost morbid sense and recollection of the same.

Still Mrs. Markham was a woman of the world, and she could make herself very pleasant when so inclined; and perhaps—such is the perversity of character and inclination— she did more to relieve and enliven the gloomy recluse at Crofton Hall than all that dear

Aunt Alice, with her cheerful, unpretending goodness, had been able to accomplish. It was not that Mr. Crofton seemed to find anything particularly charming in my step-mother’s conversation, but it appeared to be more suggestive, as it were, to him of past scenes and phases of life in which he had_ himself borne a part; and he could at times differ from her, and have the satisfaction of proving her in the wrong; whilst dear Aunt Alice being ever ready to own herself so, there was neither pleasure nor profit to be gained in any argument with her.

Thus the acquaintance between the three families progressed, and Mary Crofton’s friendship became an invaluable boon to me. I was always afraid of her brother, for he was apt to cut up my crude, girlish remarks, and to ridicule the effervescing nature of my early friendship for Mary, who was so many years older than myself. But then he was not kinder to Flora, whom, as she grew older, he watched and repressed with an uncompromising strictness that by no means suited the ideas of that very pretty and lively young lady. At the same time, he would be more tolerant of Juliet’s insipidity, and the absence of any charm of look or manner, which excited her mother’s increasing regrets and apprehensions that her daughter would after all be a very quiet and ordinary-looking girl. I remember Mr. Crofton replying once to Mrs. Markham, who frankly confided her apprehensions to him in that respect—‘ You seem to be afraid your daughter will disappoint your wishes in regard to turning out either beautiful or fascinating. Now my sentiments are the exact reverse of yours—there is nothing I fear so much for mine as that she may do both.”

Chapter III

ND so it came to pass that Flora did grow up beautiful. At seventeen she was perfectly lovely. On the other hand, at the same age (for the two girls were with a month or two of each other) Juliet had as few pretensions to good looks, without being absolutely plain, as can well be imagined. Her features were not bad, but they were utterly void of expression; her hair was light, and so was her complexion, without being remarkably fair; tall, but not graceful, and apparently apathetic to a degree that made her equally regardless of her mother’s complaints or Mr. Crofton’s questionable compliments.

I was fond of Juliet; her unruffled composure was rather soothing; and in her passive way she was much attached to me. We always got on extremely well when left to take care of each other—or, rather, when I was supposed to be her custodian.

I enjoyed the privilege of having a good governess till I was seventeen, and then it was supposed that I was qualified to teach Juliet, having been so well instructed myself. So my prudent step-mother dismissed Miss Walker, and told me I was old enough, and, it was to be hoped, well-informed enough, to make myself useful. The office laid upon me did not weigh very heavily, for Juliet was quite well disposed; so we studied together— as much or as little as we fancied.

The greatest advantage I then enjoyed was being asked by Mary Crofton to bring my sister-pupil to take her lessons and share the instructions of Flora’s school-room; which in process of time became our constant habit, the governess there declaring it was much _ pleasanter to teach two girls together than one, and that one so idle as Flora was well known to be.

No one objected to this plan. Mrs. Markham was well pleased that Juliet should reap such benefit, though she made light of, or rather chose to ignore, any obligation conferred upon herself or daughter. She would sometimes observe carelessly on our return from Crofton Hall, which was (across our fields) ttle more than a mile distant—

“Qh! so you have taken the lesson-books over to the Hall, Marian! Well, I daresay the Croftons are glad enough to get some one to learn with that idle little puss Miss Flora. Miss Miiller told me she wanted application so much; and then, though she speaks very good English for a German, I daresay she finds great advantage in talking to you, and hearing how Miss Walker arranged about your lessons and all that.”

So, according to Mrs. Markham, we were conferring, instead of receiving, obligation and instruction at one and the same time! It certainly was quite a new idea to me.

The Miss Walker referred to had been a good and efficient governess in our family for some ten years, and I was no doubt indebted to her for a very fair share of accomplishments and general information on most subjects. But she was precise and formal, and cared little about the inner life of her pupil’s hearts and minds. So, whilst the latter reaped the full benefit of such instruction as she was qualified and perfectly willing to impart, the former remained barren and unsatisfied—at least as far as’ she was concerned.

All that I needed there was, however, most tenderly supplied by the Aunt Alice I have casually mentioned; and I may as well add, that whatever there might be of good and sterling worth in my character and disposition, was owing to her gentle but most unobtrusive teaching. She was my mother’s only sister, and I believe they greatly resembled each other both in appearance and a winning sweetness of manner that was peculiar to