England has been in a dreadful state for some weeks. Lord
Coodle would go out, Sir Thomas Doodle wouldn't come in, and there being nobody
in Great Britain (to speak of) except Coodle and Doodle, there has been no
government. It is a mercy that the hostile meeting between those two great men,
which at one time seemed inevitable, did not come off, because if both pistols
had taken effect, and Coodle and Doodle had killed each other, it is to be
presumed that England must have waited to be governed until young Coodle and
young Doodle, now in frocks and long stockings, were grown up. This stupendous
national calamity, however, was averted by Lord Coodle's making the timely
discovery that if in the heat of debate he had said that he scorned and despised
the whole ignoble career of Sir Thomas Doodle, he had merely meant to say that
party differences should never induce him to withhold from it the tribute of his
warmest admiration; while it as opportunely turned out, on the other hand, that
Sir Thomas Doodle had in his own bosom expressly booked Lord Coodle to go down
to posterity as the mirror of virtue and honour. Still England has been some
weeks in the dismal strait of having no pilot (as was well observed by Sir
Leicester Dedlock) to weather the storm; and the marvellous part of the matter
is that England has not appeared to care very much about it, but has gone on
eating and drinking and marrying and giving in marriage as the old world did in
the days before the flood. But Coodle knew the danger, and Doodle knew the
danger, and all their followers and hangers-on had the clearest possible
perception of the danger. At last Sir Thomas Doodle has not only condescended to
come in, but has done it handsomely, bringing in with him all his nephews, all
his male cousins, and all his brothers-in-law. So there is hope for the old ship
yet.
Doodle has found that he must throw himself upon the country, chiefly in the
form of sovereigns and beer. In this metamorphosed state he is available in a
good many places simultaneously and can throw himself upon a considerable
portion of the country at one time. Britannia being much occupied in pocketing
Doodle in the form of sovereigns, and swallowing Doodle in the form of beer, and
in swearing herself black in the face that she does neither-- plainly to the
advancement of her glory and morality--the London season comes to a sudden end,
through all the Doodleites and Coodleites dispersing to assist Britannia in
those religious exercises.
Hence Mrs. Rouncewell, housekeeper at Chesney Wold, foresees, though no
instructions have yet come down, that the family may shortly be expected,
together with a pretty large accession of cousins and others who can in any way
assist the great Constitutional work. And hence the stately old dame, taking
Time by the forelock, leads him up and down the staircases, and along the
galleries and passages, and through the rooms, to witness before he grows any
older that everything is ready, that floors are rubbed bright, carpets spread,
curtains shaken out, beds puffed and patted, still-room and kitchen cleared for
action--all things prepared as beseems the Dedlock dignity.
This present summer evening, as the sun goes down, the preparations are
complete. Dreary and solemn the old house looks, with so many appliances of
habitation and with no inhabitants except the pictured forms upon the walls. So
did these come and go, a Dedlock in possession might have ruminated passing
along; so did they see this gallery hushed and quiet, as I see it now; so think,
as I think, of the gap that they would make in this domain when they were gone;
so find it, as I find it, difficult to believe that it could be without them; so
pass from my world, as I pass from theirs, now closing the reverberating door;
so leave no blank to miss them, and so die.
Through some of the fiery windows beautiful from without, and set, at this
sunset hour, not in dull-grey stone but in a glorious house of gold, the light
excluded at other windows pours in rich, lavish, overflowing like the summer
plenty in the land. Then do the frozen Dedlocks thaw. Strange movements come
upon their features as the shadows of leaves play there. A dense justice in a
corner is beguiled into a wink. A staring baronet, with a truncheon, gets a
dimple in his chin. Down into the bosom of a stony shepherdess there steals a
fleck of light and warmth that would have done it good a hundred years ago. One
ancestress of Volumnia, in high- heeled shoes, very like her--casting the shadow
of that virgin event before her full two centuries--shoots out into a halo and
becomes a saint. A maid of honour of the court of Charles the Second, with large
round eyes (and other charms to correspond), seems to bathe in glowing water,
and it ripples as it glows.
But the fire of the sun is dying. Even now the floor is dusky, and shadow
slowly mounts the walls, bringing the Dedlocks down like age and death. And now,
upon my Lady's picture over the great chimney- piece, a weird shade falls from
some old tree, that turns it pale, and flutters it, and looks as if a great arm
held a veil or hood, watching an opportunity to draw it over her. Higher and
darker rises shadow on the wall--now a red gloom on the ceiling--now the fire is
out.
All that prospect, which from the terrace looked so near, has moved solemnly
away and changed--not the first nor the last of beautiful things that look so
near and will so change--into a distant phantom. Light mists arise, and the dew
falls, and all the sweet scents in the garden are heavv in the air. Now the
woods settle into great masses as if they were each one profound tree. And now
the moon rises to separate them, and to glimmer here and there in horizontal
lines behind their stems, and to make the avenue a pavement of light among high
cathedral arches fantastically broken.
Now the moon is high; and the great house, needing habitation more than ever,
is like a body without life. Now it is even awful, stealing through it, to think
of the live people who have slept in the solitary bedrooms, to say nothing of
the dead. Now is the time for shadow, when every corner is a cavern and every
downward step a pit, when the stained glass is reflected in pale and faded hues
upon the floors, when anything and everything can be made of the heavy staircase
beams excepting their own proper shapes, when the armour has dull lights upon it
not easily to be distinguished from stealthy movement, and when barred helmets
are frightfully suggestive of heads inside. But of all the shadows in Chesney
Wold, the shadow in the long drawing-room upon my Lady's picture is the first to
come, the last to be disturbed. At this hour and by this light it changes into
threatening hands raised up and menacing the handsome face with every breath
that stirs.
"She is not well, ma'am," says a groom in Mrs. Rouncewell's audience-chamber.
"My Lady not well! What's the matter?"
"Why, my Lady has been but poorly, ma'am, since she was last here-- I don't
mean with the family, ma'am, but when she was here as a bird of passage like. My
Lady has not been out much for her and has kept her room a good deal."
"Chesney Wold, Thomas," rejoins the housekeeper with proud complacency, "will
set my Lady up! There is no finer air and no healthier soil in the world!"
Thomas may have his own personal opinions on this subject, probably hints
them in his manner of smoothing his sleek head from the nape of his neck to his
temples, but he forbears to express them further and retires to the servants'
hall to regale on cold meat-pie and ale.
This groom is the pilot-fish before the nobler shark. Next evening, down come
Sir Leicester and my Lady with their largest retinue, and down come the cousins
and others from all the points of the compass. Thenceforth for some weeks
backward and forward rush mysterious men with no names, who fly about all those
particular parts of the country on which Doodle is at present throwing himself
in an auriferous and malty shower, but who are merely persons of a restless
disposition and never do anything anywhere.
On these national occasions Sir Leicester finds the cousins useful. A better
man than the Honourable Bob Stables to meet the Hunt at dinner, there could not
possibly be. Better got up gentlemen than the other cousins to ride over to
polling-booths and hustings here and there, and show themselves on the side of
England, it would be hard to find. Volumnia is a little dim, but she is of the
true descent; and there are many who appreciate her sprightly conversation, her
French conundrums so old as to have become in the cycles of time almost new
again, the honour of taking the fair Dedlock in to dinner, or even the privilege
of her hand in the dance. On these national occasions dancing may be a patriotic
service, and Volumnia is constantly seen hopping about for the good of an
ungrateful and unpensioning country.
My Lady takes no great pains to entertain the numerous guests, and being
still unwell, rarely appears until late in the day. But at all the dismal
dinners, leaden lunches, basilisk balls, and other melancholy pageants, her mere
appearance is a relief. As to Sir Leicester, he conceives it utterly impossible
that anything can be wanting, in any direction, by any one who has the good
fortune to be received under that roof; and in a state of sublime satisfaction,
he moves among the company, a magnificent refrigerator.
Daily the cousins trot through dust and canter over roadside turf, away to
hustings and polling-booths (with leather gloves and hunting-whips for the
counties and kid gloves and riding-canes for the boroughs), and daily bring back
reports on which Sir Leicester holds forth after dinner. Daily the restless men
who have no occupation in life present the appearance of being rather busy.
Daily Volumnia has a little cousinly talk with Sir Leicester on the state of the
nation, from which Sir Leicester is disposed to conclude that Volumnia is a more
reflecting woman than he had thought her.
"How are we getting on?" says Miss Volumnia, clasping her hands. "ARE we
safe?"
The mighty business is nearly over by this time, and Doodle will throw
himself off the country in a few days more. Sir Leicester has just appeared in
the long drawing-room after dinner, a bright particular star surrounded by
clouds of cousins.
"Volumnia," replies Sir Leicester, who has a list in his hand, "we are doing
tolerably."
"Only tolerably!"
Although it is summer weather, Sir Leicester always has his own particular
fire in the evening. He takes his usual screened seat near it and repeats with
much firmness and a little displeasure, as who should say, I am not a common
man, and when I say tolerably, it must not be understood as a common expression,
"Volumnia, we are doing tolerably."
"At least there is no opposition to YOU," Volumnia asserts with confidence.
"No, Volumnia. This distracted country has lost its senses in many respects,
I grieve to say, but--"
"It is not so mad as that. I am glad to hear it!"
Volumnia's finishing the sentence restores her to favour. Sir Leicester, with
a gracious inclination of his head, seems to say to himself, "A sensible woman
this, on the whole, though occasionally precipitate."
In fact, as to this question of opposition, the fair Dedlock's observation
was superfluous, Sir Leicester on these occasions always delivering in his own
candidateship, as a kind of handsome wholesale order to be promptly executed.
Two other little seats that belong to him he treats as retail orders of less
importance, merely sending down the men and signifying to the tradespeople, "You
will have the goodness to make these materials into two members of Parliament
and to send them home when done."
"I regret to say, Volumnia, that in many places the people have shown a bad
spirit, and that this opposition to the government has been of a most determined
and most implacable description."
"W-r-retches!" says Volumnia.
"Even," proceeds Sir Leicester, glancing at the circumjacent cousins on sofas
and ottomans, "even in many--in fact, in most--of those places in which the
government has carried it against a faction--"
(Note, by the way, that the Coodleites are always a faction with the
Doodleites, and that the Doodleites occupy exactly the same position towards the
Coodleites.)
"--Even in them I am shocked, for the credit of Englishmen, to be constrained
to inform you that the party has not triumphed without being put to an enormous
expense. Hundreds," says Sir Leicester, eyeing the cousins with increasing
dignity and swelling indignation, "hundreds of thousands of pounds!"
If Volumnia have a fault, it is the fault of being a trifle too innocent,
seeing that the innocence which would go extremely well with a sash and tucker
is a little out of keeping with the rouge and pearl necklace. Howbeit, impelled
by innocence, she asks, "What for?"
"Volumnia," remonstrates Sir Leicester with his utmost severity. "Volumnia!"
"No, no, I don't mean what for," cries Volumnia with her favourite little
scream. "How stupid I am! I mean what a pity!"
"I am glad," returns Sir Leicester, "that you do mean what a pity."
Volumnia hastens to express her opinion that the shocking people ought to be
tried as traitors and made to support the party.
"I am glad, Volumnia," repeats Sir Leicester, unmindful of these mollifying
sentiments, "that you do mean what a pity. It is disgraceful to the electors.
But as you, though inadvertently and without intending so unreasonable a
question, asked me 'what for?' let me reply to you. For necessary expenses. And
I trust to your good sense, Volumnia, not to pursue the subject, here or
elsewhere."
Sir Leicester feels it incumbent on him to observe a crushing aspect towards
Volumnia because it is whispered abroad that these necessary expenses will, in
some two hundred election petitions, be unpleasantly connected with the word
bribery, and because some graceless jokers have consequently suggested the
omission from the Church service of the ordinary supplication in behalf of the
High Court of Parliament and have recommended instead that the prayers of the
congregation be requested for six hundred and fifty-eight gentlemen in a very
unhealthy state.
"I suppose," observes Volumnia, having taken a little time to recover her
spirits after her late castigation, "I suppose Mr. Tulkinghorn has been worked
to death."
"I don't know," says Sir Leicester, opening his eyes, "why Mr. Tulkinghorn
should be worked to death. I don't know what Mr. Tulkinghorn's engagements may
be. He is not a candidate."
Volumnia had thought he might have been employed. Sir Leicester could desire
to know by whom, and what for. Volumnia, abashed again, suggests, by
somebody--to advise and make arrangements. Sir Leicester is not aware that any
client of Mr. Tulkinghorn has been in need of his assistance.
Lady Dedlock, seated at an open window with her arm upon its cushioned ledge
and looking out at the evening shadows falling on the park, has seemed to attend
since the lawyer's name was mentioned.
A languid cousin with a moustache in a state of extreme debility now observes
from his couch that man told him ya'as'dy that Tulkinghorn had gone down t' that
iron place t' give legal 'pinion 'bout something, and that contest being over t'
day, 'twould be highly jawlly thing if Tulkinghorn should 'pear with news that
Coodle man was floored.
Mercury in attendance with coffee informs Sir Leicester, hereupon, that Mr.
Tulkinghorn has arrived and is taking dinner. My Lady turns her head inward for
the moment, then looks out again as before.
Volumnia is charmed to hear that her delight is come. He is so original, such
a stolid creature, such an immense being for knowing all sorts of things and
never telling them! Volumnia is persuaded that he must be a Freemason. Is sure
he is at the head of a lodge, and wears short aprons, and is made a perfect idol
of with candlesticks and trowels. These lively remarks the fair Dedlock delivers
in her youthful manner, while making a purse.
"He has not been here once," she adds, "since I came. I really had some
thoughts of breaking my heart for the inconstant creature. I had almost made up
my mind that he was dead."
It may be the gathering gloom of evening, or it may be the darker gloom
within herself, but a shade is on my Lady's face, as if she thought, "I would he
were!"
"Mr. Tulkinghorn," says Sir Leicester, "is always welcome here and always
discreet wheresoever he is. A very valuable person, and deservedly respected."
The debilitated cousin supposes he is "'normously rich fler."
"He has a stake in the country," says Sir Leicester, "I have no doubt. He is,
of course, handsomely paid, and he associates almost on a footing of equality
with the highest society."
Everybody starts. For a gun is fired close by.
"Good gracious, what's that?" cries Volumnia with her little withered scream.
"A rat," says my Lady. "And they have shot him."
Enter Mr. Tulkinghorn, followed by Mercuries with lamps and candles.
"No, no," says Sir Leicester, "I think not. My Lady, do you object to the
twilight?"
On the contrary, my Lady prefers it.
"Volumnia?"
Oh! Nothing is so delicious to Volumnia as to sit and talk in the dark.
"Then take them away," says Sir Leicester. "Tulkinghorn, I beg your pardon.
How do you do?"
Mr. Tulkinghorn with his usual leisurely ease advances, renders his passing
homage to my Lady, shakes Sir Leicester's hand, and subsides into the chair
proper to him when he has anything to communicate, on the opposite side of the
Baronet's little newspaper-table. Sir Leicester is apprehensive that my Lady,
not being very well, will take cold at that open window. My Lady is obliged to
him, but would rather sit there for the air. Sir Leicester rises, adjusts her
scarf about her, and returns to his seat. Mr. Tulkinghorn in the meanwhile takes
a pinch of snuff.
"Now," says Sir Leicester. "How has that contest gone?"
"Oh, hollow from the beginning. Not a chance. They have brought in both their
people. You are beaten out of all reason. Three to one."
It is a part of Mr. Tulkinghorn's policy and mastery to have no political
opinions; indeed, NO opinions. Therefore he says "you" are beaten, and not "we."
Sir Leicester is majestically wroth. Volumnia never heard of such a thing.
'The debilitated cousin holds that it's sort of thing that's sure tapn slongs
votes--giv'n--Mob.
"It's the place, you know," Mr. Tulkinghorn goes on to say in the
fast-increasing darkness when there is silence again, "where they wanted to put
up Mrs. Rouncewell's son."
"A proposal which, as you correctly informed me at the time, he had the
becoming taste and perception," observes Sir Leicester, "to decline. I cannot
say that I by any means approve of the sentiments expressed by Mr. Rouncewell
when he was here for some half-hour in this room, but there was a sense of
propriety in his decision which I am glad to acknowledge."
"Ha!" says Mr. Tulkinghorn. "It did not prevent him from being very active in
this election, though."
Sir Leicester is distinctly heard to gasp before speaking. "Did I understand
you? Did you say that Mr. Rouncewell had been very active in this election?"
"Uncommonly active."
"Against--"
"Oh, dear yes, against you. He is a very good speaker. Plain and emphatic. He
made a damaging effect, and has great influence. In the business part of the
proceedings he carried all before him."
It is evident to the whole company, though nobody can see him, that Sir
Leicester is staring majestically.
"And he was much assisted," says Mr. Tulkinghorn as a wind-up, "by his son."
"By his son, sir?" repeats Sir Leicester with awful politeness.
"By his son."
"The son who wished to marry the young woman in my Lady's service?"
"That son. He has but one."
"Then upon my honour," says Sir Leicester after a terrific pause during which
he has been heard to snort and felt to stare, "then upon my honour, upon my
life, upon my reputation and principles, the floodgates of society are burst
open, and the waters have--a-- obliterated the landmarks of the framework of the
cohesion by which things are held together!"
General burst of cousinly indignation. Volumnia thinks it is really high
time, you know, for somebody in power to step in and do something strong.
Debilitated cousin thinks--country's going-- Dayvle--steeple-chase pace.
"I beg," says Sir Leicester in a breathless condition, "that we may not
comment further on this circumstance. Comment is superfluous. My Lady, let me
suggest in reference to that young woman--"
"I have no intention," observes my Lady from her window in a low but decided
tone, "of parting with her."
"That was not my meaning," returns Sir Leicester. "I am glad to hear you say
so. I would suggest that as you think her worthy of your patronage, you should
exert your influence to keep her from these dangerous hands. You might show her
what violence would be done in such association to her duties and principles,
and you might preserve her for a better fate. You might point out to her that
she probably would, in good time, find a husband at Chesney Wold by whom she
would not be--" Sir Leicester adds, after a moment's consideration, "dragged
from the altars of her forefathers."
These remarks he offers with his unvarying politeness and deference when he
addresses himself to his wife. She merely moves her head in reply. The moon is
rising, and where she sits there is a little stream of cold pale light, in which
her head is seen.
"It is worthy of remark," says Mr. Tulkinghorn, "however, that these people
are, in their way, very proud."
"Proud?" Sir Leicester doubts his hearing.
"I should not be surprised if they all voluntarily abandoned the girl--yes,
lover and all--instead of her abandoning them, supposing she remained at Chesney
Wold under such circumstances."
"Well!" says Sir Leicester tremulously. "Well! You should know, Mr.
Tulkinghorn. You have been among them."
"Really, Sir Leicester," returns the lawyer, "I state the fact. Why, I could
tell you a story--with Lady Dedlock's permission."
Her head concedes it, and Volumnia is enchanted. A story! Oh, he is going to
tell something at last! A ghost in it, Volumnia hopes?
"No. Real flesh and blood." Mr. Tulkinghorn stops for an instant and repeats
with some little emphasis grafted upon his usual monotony, "Real flesh and
blood, Miss Dedlock. Sir Leicester, these particulars have only lately become
known to me. They are very brief. They exemplify what I have said. I suppress
names for the present. Lady Dedlock will not think me ill-bred, I hope?"
By the light of the fire, which is low, he can be seen looking towards the
moonlight. By the light of the moon Lady Dedlock can be seen, perfecfly still.
"A townsman of this Mrs. Rouncewell, a man in exactly parallel circumstances
as I am told, had the good fortune to have a daughter who attracted the notice
of a great lady. I speak of really a great lady, not merely great to him, but
married to a gentleman of your condition, Sir Leicester."
Sir Leicester condescendingly says, "Yes, Mr. Tulkinghorn," implying that
then she must have appeared of very considerable moral dimensions indeed in the
eyes of an iron-master.
"The lady was wealthy and beautiful, and had a liking for the girl, and
treated her with great kindness, and kept her always near her. Now this lady
preserved a secret under all her greatness, which she had preserved for many
years. In fact, she had in early life been engaged to marry a young rake--he was
a captain in the army-- nothing connected with whom came to any good. She never
did marry him, but she gave birth to a child of which he was the father."
By the light of the fire he can be seen looking towards the moonlight. By the
moonlight, Lady Dedlock can be seen in profile, perfectly still.
"The captain in the army being dead, she believed herself safe; but a train
of circumstances with which I need not trouble you led to discovery. As I
received the story, they began in an imprudence on her own part one day when she
was taken by surprise, which shows how difficult it is for the firmest of us
(she was very firm) to be always guarded. There was great domestic trouble and
amazement, you may suppose; I leave you to imagine, Sir Leicester, the husband's
grief. But that is not the present point. When Mr. Rouncewell's townsman heard
of the disclosure, he no more allowed the girl to be patronized and honoured
than he would have suffered her to be trodden underfoot before his eyes. Such
was his pride, that he indignantly took her away, as if from reproach and
disgrace. He had no sense of the honour done him and his daughter by the lady's
condescension; not the least. He resented the girl's position, as if the lady
had been the commonest of commoners. That is the story. I hope Lady Dedlock will
excuse its painful nature."
There are various opinions on the merits, more or less conflicting with
Volumnia's. That fair young creature cannot believe there ever was any such lady
and rejects the whole history on the threshold. The majority incline to the
debilitated cousin's sentiment, which is in few words--"no
business--Rouncewell's fernal townsman." Sir Leicester generally refers back in
his mind to Wat Tyler and arranges a sequence of events on a plan of his own.
There is not much conversation in all, for late hours have been kept at
Chesney Wold since the necessary expenses elsewhere began, and this is the first
night in many on which the family have been alone. It is past ten when Sir
Leicester begs Mr. Tulkinghorn to ring for candles. Then the stream of moonlight
has swelled into a lake, and then Lady Dedlock for the first time moves, and
rises, and comes forward to a table for a glass of water. Winking cousins,
bat-like in the candle glare, crowd round to give it; Volumnia (always ready for
something better if procurable) takes another, a very mild sip of which contents
her; Lady Dedlock, graceful, self-possessed, looked after by admiring eyes,
passes away slowly down the long perspective by the side of that nymph, not at
all improving her as a question of contrast.
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