Chapter 34

_BESSIE'S PEACEMAKING._

When Bessie Fairfax returned from Castlemount she learnt for a first piece of news that Mr. Cecil Burleigh had spent two days of her absence at Abbotsmead, and that he had only left in the morning. To this information her grandfather added that he had seen in his time unsuccessful lovers, more dejected. Bessie laughed and blushed, and said she was glad to hear he was in good spirits; and this was their first and last allusion to the crowning episode of her visit to Brentwood. The squire gave her one searching look, and thought it wisdom to be silent.

The green rides of the woods and glades of the park were all encumbered with fallen leaves. The last days of autumn were flown, and winter was come. The sound of the huntsman's horn was heard in the fields, and the squire came out in his weather-stained scarlet coat to enjoy the sport which was the greatest pleasure life had left for him. One fine soft morning at the end of November the meet was at Kirkham turnpike, and Abbotsmead entertained the gentlemen of the hunt at breakfast.

Bessie rode a little way with her grandfather, and would have ridden farther, but he sent her back with Ranby. Mr. Cecil Burleigh had once expressed a prejudice against foxhunting ladies, and when Mr. Fairfax saw his granddaughter the admiration of the miscellaneous gathering, and her acquaintance claimed by even Mr. Gifford, he adopted it. Bessie was disappointed. She liked the exercise, the vivacity of the sport, and Janey went so beautifully; but when her grandfather spoke she quietly submitted. Sir Edward Lucas, though he was charmed with her figure on horseback, was still more charmed by her obedience.

The burden of Bessie's present life threatened to be the tedium of nothing to do. She could not read, practise her songs, and learn poetry by heart all the hours of the day: less than three sufficed her often. If she had been bred in a country-house, she would have possessed numerous interests that she inevitably lacked. She was a stranger amongst the villagers--neither old nor young knew her. There was little suffering to engage her sympathy or poverty to invite her help. At Kirkham there were no long-accumulated neglects to reform as there was at Morte, and to Morte Mr. Fairfax forbade her to go. She had a liberal allowance, and not half ways enough to spend it, so she doubled her allowance to Miss Hague on behalf of her former pupils, Geoffry and Frederick; Laurence paid his own.

She was not a girl of many wants, and her taste did not incline to idle expenditure. She had seen thrift and the need of thrift in her early home, and thought money much too valuable to be wasted in buying things she did not require. Where she saw a necessity she was the freest of givers, but she had experience, gained in her rides with Mr. Carnegie, against manufacturing objects of sentimental charity.

Her resource for a little while was the study of the house and neighborhood she lived in. There was a good deal of history connected with Kirkham. But it was all contained in the county gazetteer; and when Macky had instructed her in the romance of the family, and the legends attached to the ruins by the river and the older portions of the mansion, all was learnt that there was to know, and the sum of her reflections announced aloud was, that Abbotsmead was a very big house for a small family. Macky shook her head in melancholy acquiescence.

The December days were very long, and the weather wild and stormy both by land and sea. Bessie conjectured sometimes when her uncle Frederick would come home, but it appeared presently that he was not coming. He wrote that he had laid up the Foam in one of the Danish ports to be ready for the breaking up of the winter and a further exploration of the Baltic coasts, and that he was just starting on a journey into Russia--judging that the beauty of the North is in perfection during the season of ice and snow.

"Just like one of Fred's whims!" said his father discontentedly. "As if he could not have come into Woldshire and have enjoyed the hunting! Nobody enjoyed it more than he did formerly."

He did not come, however, and Bessie was not astonished. Under other circumstances Abbotsmead might have been a cheerful house, but it seemed as if no one cared to make it cheerful now: if the days got over tranquilly, that was enough. The squire and his granddaughter dined alone day after day, Mr. Forbes relieved their monotony on Sundays, and occasionally Mr. Oliver Smith came for a night. Society was a toil to Mr. Fairfax. He did not find his house dull, and would have been surprised to know that Elizabeth did. What could she want that she had not? She had Janey to ride, and Joss, a companionable dog, to walk with; she had her carriage, and could drive to Hartwell as often as she pleased; and at her gates she had bright little Mrs. Stokes for company and excellent Mrs. Forbes for counsel. Still, Bessie felt life stagnant around her. She could not be interested in anything here without an effort. The secret of it was her hankering after the Forest, and partly also her longing for those children. To have those dear little boys over from Norminster would cheer her for the whole winter; but how to compass it? Once she thought she would bring them over without leave asked, but when she consulted Mrs. Stokes, she was assured that it would be a liberty the squire would never forgive.

"I am not afraid of being never forgiven," rejoined Bessie. "I shall do some desperate act one of these days if I am kept idle. Think of the echoes in this vast house answering only the slamming of a door! and think of what they would have to answer if dear little unruly Justus were in the old nursery!"

Mrs. Stokes laughed: "I am only half in sympathy with you. Why did you discourage that fascinating Mr. Cecil Burleigh? A young lady is never really occupied until she is in love."

Bessie colored slightly. "Well," she said, "I am in love--I am in love with my two little boy-cousins. What do you advise? My grandfather has never mentioned them. It seems as if it would be easier to set them before him than to speak of them."

"I should not dare to do that. What does Mr. Laurence Fairfax say? What does his wife say?"

"Not much. My grandfather is treating them precisely as he treated my father and my mother--just letting them alone. And it would be so much pleasanter if we were all friends! I call it happiness thrown away. I have everything at Abbotsmead but that. It is not like a home, and the only motive there was for me to try and root there is taken away since those boys came to light."

"Your future prospects are completely changed. You bear it very well."

"It is easy to bear what I am truly thankful for. Abbotsmead is nothing to me, but those boys ought to be brought up in familiarity with the place and the people. I am a stranger, and I don't think I am very apt at making humble friends. To enjoy the life one ought to begin one's apprenticeship early. I wonder why anybody strains after rank and riches? I find them no gain at all. I still think Mr. Carnegie the best gentleman I know, and his wife as true a gentlewoman as any. You are smiling at my partiality. Shall you be shocked if I add that I have met in Woldshire grand people who, if they were not known by their titles, would be reckoned amongst the very vulgar, and gentry of old extraction who bear no brand of it but that disagreeable manner which is qualified as high-bred insolence?"

Mrs. Stokes held all the conventionalities in sincere respect. She did not understand Miss Fairfax, and asked who, then, of their acquaintance was her pattern of a perfect lady. Bessie instanced Miss Burleigh. "Her sweet graciousness is never at fault, because it is the flower of her beautiful disposition," said she.

"I should never have thought of her," said Mrs. Stokes reflectively. "She is very good. But to go back to those boys: do nothing without first speaking to Mr. Fairfax."

Bessie demurred, and still believed her own bolder device the best, but she allowed herself to be overruled, and watched for an opportunity of speaking. Undoubtedly, Mr. Fairfax loved his granddaughter with more respect for her independent will than he might have done had they been together always. He had denied her no reasonable request yet, and he granted her present prayer so readily that she was only sorry she had not preferred it earlier.

"Grandpapa, you will give me a Christmas gift, will you not?" she said one evening after dinner about a week before that festive season.

"Yes, Elizabeth. What would you like?" was his easy reply. It was a satisfaction to hear that she had a wish.

"I should like to have my two little cousins from Norminster--Justus and Laury. They would quite enliven us."

Mr. Fairfax was evidently taken by surprise. Still, he did not rebuke her audacity. He was silent for a minute or two, as if reflecting, and when he answered her it was with all the courtesy that he could have shown towards a guest for whose desires he was bound to feel the utmost deference. "Certainly, Elizabeth," said he. "You have a right to be here, as I told you at your first coming, and it would be hard that I should forbid you any visitor that would enliven you. Have the little boys, by all means, if you wish it, and make yourself as happy as you can."

Elizabeth thanked him warmly. "I will write to-morrow. Oh, I know they may come--my uncle Laurence promised me," said she. "And the day before Christmas Eve, Mrs. Betts and I will go for them. I am so glad!"

Mr. Fairfax did not check her gay exuberance, and all the house heard what was to be with unfeigned joy. Mrs. Stokes rejoiced too, and pledged her own sons as playfellows for the little visitors. And when the appointed time came, Bessie did as she had said, and made a journey to Norminster, taking Mrs. Betts with her to bring the children over. Their father and pretty young mother consented to their going with the less reluctance because it seemed the first step towards the re-establishment of kindly relations with the offended squire; and Sally was sent with them.

"Next Christmas you will come too," said Bessie, happier than any queen in the exercise of her office as peacemaker, and important also as being put in charge of those incomparable boys, for Sally was, of course, under superior orders.

The first drawback to her intense delight was a whimper from Laury as he lost sight of his mamma, and the next drawback was that Justus asked to be taken home again the moment the train reached Mitford Junction. These little troubles were quickly composed, however, though liable, of course, to break out again; and Bessie felt flushed and uneasy lest the darling boys should fail of making a pleasant first impression on grandpapa. Alas for her disquiets! She need have felt none. Jonquil received her at the door with a sad countenance; and Macky, as she came forward to welcome the little gentlemen, betrayed that her temper had been tried even to tears not very long before. Jonquil did not wait to be inquired of respecting his master, but immediately began to say, in reply to his young lady's look of troubled amazement, "The squire, miss, has gone on a journey. I was to tell you that he had left you the house to yourself."

"Gone on a journey? But he will return before night?" said Bessie.

"No, miss. We are to expect him this day week, when Mr. Laurence's children have gone back to Norminster," explained the old servant in a lower voice.

Bessie comprehended the whole case instantly. Macky was relieving her pent feelings by making a fuss with the little boys, and giving Mrs. Betts her mind on the matter. The group stood disconcerted in the hall for several minutes, the door open and the low winter sun shining upon them. Bessie did not speak--she could not. She gazed at the children, pale herself and trembling all over. Justus began to ask where was grandpapa, and Laury repeated his question like a lisping echo. There was no answer to give them, but they were soon pacified in the old nursery where their father had played, and were made quite happy with a grand parade of new toys on the floor, expressly provided for the occasion. Bed-time came early, and Bessie was relieved when it did come. Never in the whole course of her life had she felt so hurt, so insulted, so injured; and yet she was pained, intensely pained, for the old man too. Perhaps he had meant her to be so, and that was her punishment. Jonquil could give her no information as to whither his master had gone, but he offered a conjecture that he had most probably gone up to London.

If it was any comfort to know that the old servants of the house sympathized with her, Bessie had that. They threw themselves heart and soul into the work of promoting the pleasure of the little visitors. Jonquil proved an excellent substitute for grandpapa, and Macky turned out an inexhaustible treasury of nice harmless things to eat, of funny rhymes to sing, and funny stories to tell in a dramatic manner. Still, it was a holiday spoilt. It was not enjoyed in the servants' hall nor in the housekeeper's room. No amount of Yule logs or Yule cakes could make a merry Christmas of it that year. All the neighbors had heard with satisfaction that Mr. Fairfax's little grandsons were to be brought to Abbotsmead, and such as had children made a point of coming over with them, so that the way in which Miss Fairfax's effort at peacemaking had failed was soon generally known, and as generally disapproved. Mrs. Stokes, that indignant young matron, qualified the squire's behavior as "Quite abominable!" but she declared that she would not vex herself if she were Miss Fairfax--"No, indeed!" Bessie tried hard not. She tried to be dignified, but her disappointment was too acute, and her grandfather's usage of her too humiliating, to be borne with her ordinary philosophy.

She let her uncle Laurence know what had happened by letter, and on the day fixed for the children to go home again she went with them, attended by Mrs. Betts as before. Mr. Laurence Fairfax was half amused at the method by which his father had evaded Bessie's bold attempt to rule him, and his blossom of a wife was much too happy to care for the old squire's perversity unless he cared; but they were both sorry for Bessie.

"My grandfather lets me have everything but what I want," she said with a tinge of rueful humor. "He surrounds me with every luxury, and denies me the drink of cold water that I thirst for. I wish I could escape from his tyranny. We were beginning to be friends, and this has undone it all. A refusal would not have been half so unkind."

"There is nothing but time to trust to," said her uncle Laurence. "My father's resentment is not active, but it lasts."

Bessie was quite alone that long evening, the last of the old year: at Beechhurst or at Brook there was certainly a party. Nor had she any intimation of the time of her grandfather's return beyond what Jonquil had been able to give her a week ago. He had not written since he left, and an accumulation of letters awaited him in his private room, Jonquil having been unable to forward any for want of an address. The dull routine of the house proceeded for three days more, and then the master reappeared at luncheon without notice to anybody.

Mr. Fairfax took his seat at the table, ate hungrily, and looked so exactly like himself, and so unconscious of having done anything to provoke anger, to give pain or cause anxiety, that Bessie's imaginary difficulties in anticipation of his return were instantly removed. He made polite inquiries after Janey and Joss, and even hoped that Bessie had been enlivened by her little cousins' visit. She would certainly not have mentioned them if he had not, but, as he asked the question, she was not afraid to answer him.

"Yes," said she, "children are always good company to me, especially boys; and they behaved so nicely, though they are very high-spirited, that I don't think they would have been inconvenient if you had stayed at home."

"Indeed? I am glad to hear they are being well brought up," said the squire; and then he turned to Jonquil and asked for his letters.