CHAPTER I.

THE TIME WILL COME.

"_Le jour viendra_--it is the motto of our family--given to us by Henry VI. 'The day will come,'" said old Lord Lamorna, proudly, as he lay back in his easy chair, with his elbows resting on the arms thereof, and the tips of his upraised fingers placed together, as if he was about to pray; "and most applicable is that motto to you, nephew Richard, for I am sure that when you are my age you will regret not having taken my advice."

Richard Trevelyan smiled, but looked somewhat uneasily at his younger brother Downie.

"You are too rich to throw yourself away, and too well-born even for the most highly accomplished daughter of a cotton-lord, or knighted mill-owner," resumed his stately old uncle, sententiously; "a fellow knighted too probably for dirty ministerial work; but assume a virtue if you have it not, and let us see you----"

"Excuse me, my lord--excuse me, my dear uncle. I have no desire to--to marry; why you--yourself----"

"Don't cite me, Richard. You are only forty-three, if so much" (and here, for the information of our young lady readers, we may mention that Richard is not the hero of these pages). "I am past seventy, yet I may marry yet, and do you all out of the title," added Lamorna, with a laugh like a cackle.

"My brother Dick is certainly the most listless of men," said Downie, as he selected some grapes with the embossed scissors, and filled his glass with chateau d'Yquem.

"I don't think that I am so," retorted Richard.

"Downie is right," said Lord Lamorna. "Why do you not go into Parliament?--I have two snug pocket boroughs here in Cornwall--and on one hand attack routine and red-tapeism like a Radical; on the other hand, denounce retrenchment and cowardly peace-at-any-price, like a Tory of the old school. You would certainly be popular with both parties by that _rôle_, and do good to the country at large."

"I have no turn for politics, uncle."

"Diplomacy then--many of our family have figured as diplomats; I was ambassador to Russia, after Waterloo, and in the olden time more than one of our family have been so to the Courts of Scotland, France, and Brandenburg; and I trust we all refuted the axiom of Sir Henry Wotton, 'that an ambassador was an honest man sent abroad to lie for the good of his country.'"

"I have no taste for diplomacy."

"What the devil _have_ you a taste for?" asked his uncle, testily; "not domestic life, as I can't get you to marry, like Downie here; and you soon left the army, or tired of Her Majesty's service."

Richard flushed for a moment, and held his full wine glass between him and the light, as if to test the colour and purity of its contents.

"I know what bachelor London life is--another style of thing, of course, from yours, Downie--that which someone calls the hard-working life, which begins at two P.M. one day, and ends at four A.M. next morning. There are the parks; the club, with its bow-window; flirtations at balls and assemblies; the opera, and parties to Greenwich; and then there is the darker picture of doing business with old Messrs. Bill Stamp and Cent.-per-Cent., in some dingy little den off the Strand. A bad style of thing it is to meddle with the long-nosed fellows in the discounting line; just as bad as--and often the sequence to--running after actresses or opera-singers. You may love them if you like; but, great Heavens! never stoop to the madness of committing matrimony with any of them, or for a moment forget the family to which you belong, and the ancient title that is your inheritance."

All this was said with undisguised point and pomposity; the cold grey eyes of Downie Trevelyan had a strange, sour smile in them; and Richard's face grew more flushed than ever now.

Dinner was over in the stately dining-room of Rhoscadzhel; Mr. Jasper Funnel, the portly, florid, and white-haired butler, had placed the glittering crystal decanters before his master, who, with two nephews, Richard and Downie Trevelyan, were lingering over their wine; while in the western light of a September evening, through the tall plate-glass windows that reached from the richly-carpeted floor to the painted and gilded ceiling, the Isles of Scilly--the Casserites of the Greeks, the rocks consecrated by the pagan Cornavi to the Sun--could be seen at the far horizon, literally cradled in the golden blaze of his setting in the sea; for the house of Rhoscadzhel, in which our story opens, stands near the Land's End, in the brave old Duchy of Cornwall.

Audley Trevelyan, tenth Lord Lamorna, took his title from that little bay or cove which was one of the most romantic spots on the bluff Cornish coast, until it was unfortunately selected by certain utilitarian speculators as a site for granite works; and near it is a place called the Trewoofe, a triple entrenchment having a subterranean passage, wherein Launcelot Lord Lamorna, with some other Cornish cavaliers, hid themselves in time of defeat from the troopers of Fairfax, as the tourist may find duly recorded in his "John Murray."

He was in his seventieth year; pale in face and thin in figure, and with his accurate evening costume, for his valet always dressed him for dinner even when alone, the old peer in every gesture and tone displayed the easy bearing of a polished man of the world, and of the highest bearing--keen but cold, calm and unimpressionable.

He had yet much of the wasted beau about his appearance; he wore rosettes on his shoes and still adhered to a frilled shirt front and black watered silk ribbon for his gold eye-glass, with a coat having something of the high collar and cut peculiar to the days when George IV. was king. His features were fine and delicately modelled; his nose a perfect aquiline, with nostrils arched and thin, his snow-white hair was all brushed back to conceal the bald places and to display more fully a forehead of which he had been vain in youth from a fancied resemblance to that of Lord Byron. In short the Apollo of many a ball-room was now indeed a lean and slippered pantaloon, but still careful to a degree in costume and all the niceties of cuffs and studs and rings.

Calm and self-possessed as he appeared, when now lying back in his down easy-chair, sipping his iced wine and playing with the diamond that glittered on his wasted hand, and which had been a farewell gift from the Empress of Russia, he had been much of a _roué_ in his youth, and consequently was not disposed to enquire too closely into the affairs of his nephew.

Downie Trevelyan was already married, nearly to his uncle's satisfaction, his wife being the daughter of a poor but noble family; and as for Richard, he might run away with as many humble girls as he chose, provided he did not marry any of them, or make that which his haughty uncle and monetary patron would never forgive--a _mésalliance_; for Lord Lamorna was a man full of strong aristocratic prejudices, and a master in all the tactics of society, and of his somewhat exclusive, and occasionally selfish class.

His lordship's false teeth--a magnificent Parisian set that had cost him some fifty guineas--would have chattered at the idea of any member of his family making a mistake in matrimony. He had heard ugly whispers about Richard, but never could discover aught that was tangible. If it existed, Heavens! how were Burke, Debrett and Co. to record it when the time came that it could no longer be concealed?

Should any _mésalliance_ be the case, he had vowed often that the barren title should go without one acre of land to his eldest nephew; and he would have willed that past him too had it been in his power to do so; but though a sordid Scottish Earl of Caithness once sold his title to a Highland Chieftain, and caused one of the last clan-battles to be fought in Scotland, such things cannot be done now.

The old man had one ever present, ever prevailing idea--the honour and dignity of the family--the Cornish Trevelyans of Rhoscadzhel and Lamorna.

His two nephews were men in the prime of life, but Downie was three years younger than his brother.

Richard Pencarrow Trevelyan, the elder and prime favourite with their uncle, was a remarkably handsome man, with fine regular features that closely resembled those of the old peer; but Richard had been reared at Sandhurst, been in the army and seen much of a rougher life than his uncle. He had a free bold bearing, an ample chest, an athletic form and muscular limbs, which riding, shooting and handling the bat and the oar had all developed to the full, and which his simple costume,--for he was fresh with his gun and his game-bag, from the bleak Cornish moors and mountain sides--advantageously displayed.

His dark blue eyes that were almost black, and seemed so by night, had a keen but open expression, his mouth suggested good humour, his white and regular teeth, perfect health, and his voice had in it a chord that rendered it most pleasant to the ear. Dark eyebrows and a heavy moustache imparted much of character to his face.

His brother, Downie Trevelyan, had never been an idler like Richard. Educated at Rugby and Corpus Christi, Oxford, he had been duly called to the bar by the Honourable Society of Lincoln's Inn, and was now in good practice as a Barrister in London. He had all the air and bearing of a gentleman of good style; but he was less handsome than Richard; had less candour of expression in eye and manner; indeed, his eyes were like cold grey steel, and were quick, restless, and at times furtive in their glances; and they never smiled, even when his mouth seemed to do so.

Unlike Richard, he was closely shaven, all save a pair of very short and legal looking whiskers. To please his uncle was one of the unwearying tasks of his life; and even now, with this view, he was in the most accurate evening dress, thus affording a complete contrast to the rough and unceremonious tweed-suit worn by his brother--his coat broadly lapelled with black silk _moiré_, his vest with three buttons, _en suite_ with his shirt studs, which were encrusted with brilliants. His cold formality of manner rendered his periodical visits to Rhoscadzhel somewhat dull to Lord Lamorna, for somehow few people cared much for Mr. Downie Trevelyan. He had married judiciously and early in life, and had now several children; and thus, while joining his uncle in reprehending or rallying Richard on his supposed anti-matrimonial views, his cold, pale eyes, were wandering over the appurtenances, the comforts and splendour of that magnificent apartment, in which he was mentally appraising everything, from the steel fire-irons, to the gold and silver plate that glittered on the carved walnut wood side-board, whereon were displayed many beautiful cups, groups and statuettes (race-trophies of Ascot, Epsom and other courses) which had been won in Lamorna's younger days, when his stud was second to none in England, and certainly equal to that of Lord Eglinton in Scotland; yet he had never been a gambler, or a "horsey man," being too highly principled in one instance, and too highly bred in the other; and so we say, while the legal eyes of Downie appraised all, he thought of his eldest son, Audley Trevelyan, then a subaltern in a dashing Hussar Regiment, and marvelled in his heart, if he should ever reign as Lord of Rhoscadzhel, manor and chace, with all its moors and tin-mines.

"You were right to marry young, Downie," said the old lord, resuming the theme of their conversation after a pause, adding, as if he almost divined the thoughts of his younger nephew, "your boy Audley is, I hear from General Trecarrel, a handsome fellow."

"He is a perfect Trevelyan, my lord," replied Downie, who was studious in always according the title to his relative, "and then my daughter, Gartha, bids fair to equal her mother, who was one of the handsomest women in London."

"To see your family rising about you thus, must afford you intense pleasure, Downie; but I cannot understand our friend Dick here at all. My years may not be many now, and I do not wish my hereditary estate to change hands often, or my lands to be scattered even after I am done with them."

"I do not comprehend your fears, my dear uncle," said Richard, smiling; "your estates can never lack heirs while God spares me--and then there is Downie----"

"And his son Audley the Hussar--you would say?"

"Exactly," replied Richard, but in a strange faint voice, and as he spoke he felt that the keen grey eyes of Downie were regarding him attentively by the waxen lights of the chandelier, which Mr. Jasper Funnel and two tall footmen had just illuminated, at the same time drawing the heavy curtains of crimson damask over the last flash of the setting sun, and the ruddy sea whose waves were rolling in blue and gold, between the bluffs of Land's End and the rocky Isles of Scilly.

"You cannot be a woman-hater, Dick?"

"No--far from it," replied Richard, as a soft expression stole over his manly face; "there can be no such thing in nature."

"The truth is--but take your wine--I strongly fear, that during your military peregrinations, you have got yourself entangled now--and unworthily perhaps."

"My lord--you are mistaken," replied Richard firmly--almost sternly; "but what causes you to think so?"

"Your so decidedly declining an introduction to General Trecarrel and his two daughters--the most beautiful girls in the duchy of Cornwall. They come of a good family too; and as the couplet has it:--

"'By Tre, Pol, and Pen, Ye may know the Cornish men.'"

"The General resides somewhere near Porthellick, does he not?" asked Downie, who saw that his brother was changing colour, or rather losing it fast.

"Some one told me, Dick, that it was rumoured you got into a scrape in Edinburgh, 'that village somewhere in the North,' as one of our humourists calls it; it was to the effect that your landlady had fallen over head and ears in love with her handsome lodger, who was ditto ditto in her debt, and had to soothe her ruffled feelings and settle her bill, by matrimony at sight."

"An utter scandal!" said Richard, now laughing. "Your allowance to me, ever since I left the Cornish Light Infantry, has been too generous for such a catastrophe ever to occur."

"And next came a story, that when you were at Montreal with the regiment, you made a precious mess of it with some pretty girl, and--to use Downie's phraseology--parted as heart-broken lovers, to figure as plaintiff and defendant at the bar."

"Worse still and as false, my lord!" exclaimed Richard, now pale with suppressed passion.

"Don't look so darkly, Richard," said Lord Lamorna, who saw the flash in his nephew's dark blue eyes; "I have had a pretty little box at Chertsey, and a villa at St. John's Wood in my day, when my friends, raven-tressed, or golden-haired as the case might be, were amiable and tenderly attached--but deuced expensive; so I must not be severe upon you," added the old man, with his dry cackling laugh. "It is not these kind of little arrangements I fear, but a _mésalliance_; and there are scandals even in London--yes, even in the mighty world of London, though there they soon die; they don't live and take root, as in the so-called purer air of the country."

"I cannot understand all those vague hints, tales and rumours, or who sets them afloat," replied Richard, making an effort to preserve his calmness.

Downie saw the veins rise in his brother's forehead while their uncle had been speaking; and he smiled a quiet smile, as he bent curiously over his glass.

"Full many a shaft at random sent, Finds mark the archer never meant;"

and he could see that some of the random remarks in the present conversation, rankled deeply in Richard's breast; and that this conversation had verged, more than once, on somewhat dangerous ground.

"Well, it is a marvel to me, Richard, how a handsome fellow like you can have escaped so long, known as you are to be the heir to my title and estates," continued the old lord, still harping on the same topic: "for the girls now go in for winning in matrimony, as we used to do at Ascot and Epsom."

"How, my lord?" asked Downie, as if he had never heard the joke before.

"By a neck--a bare neck and bosom added; witness the beautiful and aristocratic demi-mondes at the Opera! Elizabeth was the first English-woman who, to excite admiration, exposed her person thus. The virgin queen wore a huge ruff certainly; but it stuck up _behind_ her, she was _décolletée_ enough in front."

"I prefer her Scottish rival--collared to her pretty neck, and sleeved to the slender wrist," said Richard Trevelyan; "by Jove, I should not have cared for flirting with a woman who carried a fan in one hand and a hatchet in the other."

"Our ancestor, Henry Lord Lamorna, was governor of Rougemont Castle, in Devonshire, under Queen Elizabeth," said the peer pompously; "but having married the daughter of a simple knight in Surrey, he lost Her Majesty's favour at Court, and had to live in retirement here at Rhoscadzhel. Let that mistake be a warning to you, Richard."

"It happened pretty long ago," replied Richard, laughing; "and at forty years of age I am surely unlikely to commit an act of folly----"

"If it be not committed already?"

--"And lose your favour, even by marrying, 'the daughter of a simple knight.'"

"With my favour you would lose this fine estate. But give me your hand, Dick, I know you will never do aught unworthy of our good old Cornish name of Trevelyan!"

With a grand old-fashioned air--yet one full of kindness--the proud old man presented his thin white hand to his nephew, who pressed it affectionately, and then rose to withdraw.

"Whither go you, Dick, so soon?"

"Oh--anywhere, uncle," replied the other, wearily.

"How, sir?"

"Merely into the lawn to enjoy a post-prandial cigar," replied Richard, whose face wore an evident expression of annoyance, as he bowed and quitted the room.

"We have worried him, I fear," said Downie, with a self-satisfied smile.

"Don't use slang--it is bad in tone," replied his uncle; "but I cannot make your brother out--I hope he is not deceiving us all. Gad, if I thought so--if that Montreal story should prove true----" the peer paused, and his keen blue eyes flashed with anger at the vague thoughts that occurred to him.

"Oh, do not fear, my lord," said Downie Trevelyan, in a suave and soothing manner; "though sham diamonds often do duty for real ones."

"What do you mean?" asked his uncle, haughtily.

Downie only smiled, and bent over his glass of Burgundy again.

"_Neb na gare y gwayn call restona,_" said Lord Lamorna, significantly; "I hate proverbs: but this is a good old Cornish one; 'he that heeds not gain, must expect _loss_.' When do you expect your oldest boy home from India?"

"He may arrive next week, perhaps, my lord, and he will at once dutifully hasten to present himself to you."

"He must be well up among the Lieutenants of the Hussars now?"

"Yet he means to exchange into the Infantry."

"Why?"

"It is a matter of expedience and expense, my lord; even with forage, batta, tentage, and so forth, he finds his regiment a very extravagant one."

"I shall give him a cheque on Coutts and Co., for I must not forget that you did me the honour to name him after me."

"But you did us the greater honour in being his sponsor--and in bestowing upon him a gold sponsorial mug."

"With the _Koithgath_ of the Trevelyans for a handle, and another perched on the lid; well, well--he may be my successor here--who knows, who knows," mumbled the old man, as he prepared to take his-after dinner nap, by spreading a cambric handkerchief over his face, and Downie glided noiselessly away to the library, with a strange and unfathomable smile on his colourless face, and he muttered,--

"I too may say--'the time will come!'"