Chapter 9

Though by no means superstitious, there was one circumstance, and only one, with regard to which I sometimes doubted whether it was not influenced by some fatality, and the present case was connected with it.

With another boy, I was passing out of the archway leading upon Windsor Terrace, in order to hear the Life Guards' band, which here played every Sunday evening, when once more I met with Miss Curzon. She was coming away, and at that instant was walking between two other ladies. This time, then, there was no doubt: as I passed, she made a very slight, but slow bend of her neck; at the same time there was in her face a fixed and serious expression. Slight as was the recognition, it was undoubted.

"Why, Graham," presently exclaimed the friend I was walking with, "that lady bowed to you!"

"And why should she not?"

"And why should you blush about it so?"

Never mind that--this was, and ever has been, if not the happiest, the loveliest moment of my life.

On turning back, that I might, should fortune favour me, obtain some farther traces of her, I just glimpsed her as she entered a carriage, which drove away in the direction of Datchet.

Once again, then, was I at fault, still possessing not the faintest suspicion of her retreat, for resident in the neighbourhood I was now confident she must be.

It was six years and more since I had heard her voice. From that moment I had dwelt upon it and her, with all my mind, with all my heart, and with all my soul. But then, this might have been an ideal passion, as has happened to many of us, and we have never been less enamoured than when in the immediate presence of its object: but in this instance it was very different, creating a kind of fretful happiness quite intolerable. Byron says, in his ever-glowing way, that--

"Sweeter far than this, than these, than all, Is first and passionate love!"

But, he should have added, what probably he meant, early love. Love at twenty is as nothing, unless one's a fool. Downright love exists only with boyish and the wildest romance, infinitely removed from every grain of common sense. I will give an instance of this boyish weakness, though a ridiculous one.

There was a maid-servant in Eton, who was a modest, respectable, and certainly very pretty girl. Notwithstanding the stoutness of her ancle, she had made a deep impression on many of the bigger boys, though probably not one of them had exchanged a syllable with her. This girl now became betrothed to a Windsor tradesman. No sooner was this ascertained, than her admirers let him plainly know, that should he presume to prosecute his design, it should cost him dearly. Several of them now never met the poor fellow without insulting him; and I remember one boy, more ardent than the rest, went into his shop and fought him chivalrously, like a good knight and true. So high did the feud now run, that the shop-keepers sided with their townsman, and for months half the school was each evening engaged in a spirited skirmish with the Windsor mobility for this Fair Maid of Perth; and I believe that, in consequence of the excitement they evinced on the occasion, the match was postponed for nearly two years. The boy who particularised himself for his pugnacious prowess has since become a preacher in the open fields, and a zealous supporter of the miraculously unknown tongues.

"But these are foolish things to all the wise," and particularly so to me, though my head was altogether turned, and my heart too. My days were more than ever dedicated to roaming over the country; and in the evening I used to love to scull my skiff far up the stream, and then float quietly down while I watched the sun setting, and the luxurious yet modest forget-me-not, on the banks; then leave my boat to sit motionless on a retired stile, and listen to "the still small voice" of the mysterious bat, or the drowsy soothing hum of the beetle. One of these evenings, by the bye, was productive of a little adventure.

I had just accomplished "the shallows," and was now rowing hard against the stream opposite Boveney Church, when I was startled for the moment by the sounds of a number of female voices, some of which even amounted to screams. On looking over my shoulder, I now observed an enormous pleasure-barge, with its deck and cabin crowded with a numerous party of ladies and gentlemen. It was drawn up the stream by three or four horses. At this spot the stream ran with such rapidity, that a boat which was fastened to the stern, had broken away, and the ladies became, in a degree, panic-struck, when they saw their only means of communication with the shore quickly floating away from them.

It was now for me to do my best to capture it, though when I had fastened it to my skiff, it was with great difficulty that I could stem the stream with it, and reach them. Having at length succeeded in this, the instant I arrived, in addition to innumerable thanks, many fair and braceleted wrists were now proffering full and fizzing bumpers of champagne, while others showered various fruits into my skiff.

Without any hesitation, I emptied a respectable number of glasses of their contents; and having declined the rest, they were reluctantly withdrawn, with the exception of one. I thought I might as well take that; I looked at its fair and kind donor, and--there was Miss Curzon! As I raised the glass to my lips, I glanced across its brim, and again the same depression of the slender figure--the same expression and mixture of fixed seriousness!

Now, then, I at last had a certainty of gleaning some tidings of her. I saw Maberly standing by her side, and, the next morning, I questioned him closely, but warily, upon the subject.

"I was rather lucky, last night, Maberly," I observed.

"Yes," he replied; "it was no common person who gave you that glass of wine. Do you not think she was very lovely?"

"There were several lovely persons," I answered.

"You know whom I mean."

"O yes," I prudently answered; "she was sitting on a sofa, close to the steerage, and gave me--bless her!--the first glass of wine."

"Thank you," said Maberly; "that was my sister."

"Then she was a very nice-looking person," I replied.

"Don't you recollect, now, the girl who held out the last glass to you?"

"Perfectly; but is she the person you admire so?"

"Oh! you know, you're near-sighted, or you would have thought so."

"And who is she, after all?"

"I am not quite certain that I know her name," said Maberly; "but I suppose it is the same as her uncle's, Mr. St. Quentin, with whom she lives there, at the Grange, by Old Windsor."

I said but little more, and withdrew, by no means dissatisfied with the information I had gained.