Wilfrid Cumbermede by George MacDonald

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'Yes,' I answered--'some time ago.'

'And may I ask what you're turning your attention to now?'

'Well, I hardly like to confess it, but I mean to have a try
at--something in the literary way.'

'Plucky enough! The paths of literature are not certainly the paths of
pleasantness or of peace even--so far as ever I heard. Somebody said
you were going in for the law.'

'I thought there were too many lawyers already. One so often hears of
barristers with nothing to do, and glad to take to the pen, that I
thought it might be better to begin with what I should most probably
come to at last.'

'Ah! but, Mr Cumbermede, there are other departments of the law which
bring quicker returns than the bar. If you would put yourself in my
hands now, you should be earning your bread at least within a couple of
years or so.'

'You are very kind,' I returned, heartily, for he spoke as if he meant
what he said; 'but you see I have a leaning to the one and not to the
other. I should like to have a try first, at all events.'

'Well, perhaps it's better to begin by following your bent. You may
find the road take a turn, though.'

'Perhaps. I will go on till it does, though.'

While we talked, Clara had followed her father, and was now patting my
mare's neck with a nice, plump, fair-fingered hand. The creature stood
with her arched neck and small head turned lovingly towards her.

'What a nice white thing you have got to ride!' she said. 'I hope it is
your own.'

'Why do you hope that?' I asked.

'Because it's best to ride your own horse, isn't it?' she answered,
looking up naively.

'Would _you_ like to ride her? I believe she has carried a lady, though
not since she came into my possession.'

Instead of answering me, she looked round at her father, who stood by
smiling benignantly. Her look said--

'If papa would let me.'

He did not reply, but seemed waiting. I resumed.

'Are you a good horsewoman, Miss--Clara?' I said, with a feel after the
recovery of old privileges.

'I must not sing my own praises, Mr--Wilfrid,' she rejoined, 'but I
_have_ ridden in Rotten Row, and I believe without any signal
disgrace.'

'Have you got a side-saddle?' I asked, dismounting.

Mr Coningham spoke now.

'Don't you think Mr Cumbermede's horse a little too frisky for you,
Clara? I know so little about you, I can't tell what you're fit
for.--She used to ride pretty well as a girl,' he added, turning to me.

'I've not forgotten that,' I said. 'I shall walk by her side, you
know.'

'Shall you?' she said, with a sly look.

'Perhaps,' I suggested, 'your grandfather would let me have his horse,
and then we might have a gallop across the park.'

'The best way,' said Mr Coningham, 'will be to let the gardener take
your horse, while you come in and have some luncheon. We'll see about
the mount after that. My horse has to carry me back in the evening,
else I should be happy to join you. She's a fine creature, that of
yours.'

'She's the handiest creature!' I said--'a little skittish, but very
affectionate, and has a fine mouth. Perhaps she ought to have a
curb-bit for you, though, Miss Clara.'

'We'll manage with a snaffle,' she answered, with, I thought, another
sly glance at me, out of eyes sparkling with suppressed merriment and
expectation! Her father had gone to find the gardener, and as we stood
waiting for him she still stroked the mare's neck.

'Are you not afraid of taking cold,' I said, 'without your bonnet?'

'I never had a cold in my life,' she returned.

'That is saying much. You would have me believe you are not made of the
same clay as other people.'

'Believe anything you like,' she answered carelessly.

'Then I do believe it,' I rejoined.

She looked me in the face, took her hand from the mare's neck, stepped
back half-a-foot and looked round, saying--

'I wonder where that man can have got to. Oh, here he comes, and papa
with him!'

We went across the trim little lawn, which lay waiting for the warmer
weather to burst into a profusion of roses, and through a trellised
porch entered a shadowy little hall, with heads of stags and foxes, an
old-fashioned glass-doored bookcase, and hunting and riding whips,
whence we passed into a low-pitched drawing-room, redolent of dried
rose-leaves and fresh hyacinths. A little pug-dog, which seemed to have
failed in swallowing some big dog's tongue, jumped up barking from the
sheep-skin mat, where he lay before the fire.

'Stupid pug!' said Clara. 'You never know friends from foes! I wonder
where my aunt is.'

She left the room. Her father had not followed us. I sat down on the
sofa, and began turning over a pretty book bound in red silk, one of
the first of the _annual_ tribe, which lay on the table. I was deep in
one of its eastern stories when, hearing a slight movement, I looked
up, and there sat Clara in a low chair by the window, working at a
delicate bit of lace with a needle. She looked somehow as if she had
been there an hour at least. I laid down the book with some
exclamation.

'What is the matter, Mr Cumbermede?' she asked, with the slightest
possible glance up from the fine meshes of her work.

'I had not the slightest idea you were in the room.'

'Of course not. How could a literary man, with a _Forget-me-not_ in his
hand, be expected to know that a girl had come into the room?'

'Have you been at school all this time?' I asked, for the sake of
avoiding a silence.

'All what time?'

'Say, since we parted in Switzerland.'

'Not quite. I have been staying with an aunt for nearly a year. Have
you been at college all this time?'

'At school and college. When did you come home?'

'This is not my home, but I came here yesterday.'

'Don't you find the country dull after London?'

'I haven't had time yet.'

'Did they give you riding lessons at school?'

'No. But my aunt took care of my morals in that respect. A girl might
as well not be able to dance as ride now-a-days.'

'Who rode with you in the park? Not the riding-master?'

With a slight flush on her face she retorted,

'How many more questions are you going to ask me? I should like to
know, that I may make up my mind how many of them to answer.'

'Suppose we say six.'

'Very well,' she replied. 'Now I shall answer your last question and
count that the first. About nine o'clock, one--day--'

'Morning or evening?' I asked.

'Morning of course--I walked out of--the house--'

'Your aunt's house?'

'Yes, of course, my aunt's house. Do let me go on with my story. It was
getting a little dark--'

'Getting dark at nine in the morning?'

'In the evening, I said.'

'I beg your pardon, I thought you said the morning.'

'No, no, the evening; and of course I was a little frightened, for I
was not accustomed--'

'But you were never out alone at that hour,--in London?'

'Yes, I was quite alone. I had promised to meet--a friend at the corner
of----You know that part, do you?'

'I beg your pardon. What part?'

'Oh--Mayfair. You know Mayfair, don't you?'

'You were going to meet a gentleman at the corner of Mayfair--were
you?' I said, getting quite bewildered.

She jumped up, clapping her hands as gracefully as merrily, and
crying--

'I wasn't going to meet any gentleman. There! Your six questions are
answered. I won't answer a single other you choose to ask, unless I
please, which is not in the least likely.'

She made me a low half merry, half mocking courtesy and left the room.

The same moment her father came in, following old Mr Coningham, who
gave me a kindly welcome, and said his horse was at my service, but he
hoped I would lunch with him first. I gratefully consented, and soon
luncheon was announced. Miss Coningham, Clara's aunt, was in the
dining-room before us. A dry, antiquated woman, she greeted me with
unexpected frankness. Lunch was half over before Clara entered--in a
perfectly fitting habit, her hat on, and her skirt thrown over her arm.

'Soho, Clara!' cried her father; 'you want to take us by
surprise--coming out all at once a town-bred lady, eh?'

'Why, where ever did you get that riding-habit, Clara?' said her aunt.

'In my box, aunt,' said Clara.

'My word, child, but your father has kept you in pocket-money!'
returned Miss Coningham.

'I've got a town aunt as well as a country one,' rejoined Clara, with
an expression I could not quite understand, but out of which her laugh
took only half the sting.

Miss Coningham reddened a little. I judged afterwards that Clara had
been diplomatically allowing her just to feel what sharp claws she had
for use if required.

But the effect of the change from loose white muslin to tight dark
cloth was marvellous, and I was bewitched by it. So slight, yet so
round, so trim, yet so pliant--she was grace itself. It seemed as if
the former object of my admiration had vanished, and I had found
another with such surpassing charms that the loss could not be
regretted. I may just mention that the change appeared also to bring
out a certain look of determination which I now recalled as having
belonged to her when a child.

'Clara!' said her father, in a very marked tone; whereupon it was
Clara's turn to blush and be silent.

I started some new subject, in the airiest manner I could command.
Clara recovered her composure, and I flattered myself she looked a
little grateful when our eyes met. But I caught her father's eyes
twinkling now and then as if from some secret source of merriment, and
could not help fancying he was more amused than displeased with his
daughter.

CHAPTER XXVI.

A RIDING LESSON.

By the time luncheon was over, the horses had been standing some
minutes at the lawn-gate, my mare with a side-saddle. We hastened to
mount, Clara's eyes full of expectant frolic. I managed, as I thought,
to get before her father, and had the pleasure of lifting her to the
saddle. She was up ere I could feel her weight on my arm. When I
gathered her again with my eyes, she was seated as calmly as if at her
lace-needlework, only her eyes were sparkling. With the slightest help,
she had her foot in the stirrup, and with a single movement had her
skirt comfortable. I left her, to mount the horse they had brought me,
and when I looked from his back, the white mare was already flashing
across the boles of the trees, and Clara's dark skirt flying out behind
like the drapery of a descending goddess in an allegorical picture.
With a pang of terror I fancied the mare had run away with her, and sat
for a moment afraid to follow, lest the sound of my horse's feet on the
turf should make her gallop the faster. But the next moment she turned
in her saddle, and I saw a face alive with pleasure and confidence. As
she recovered her seat, she waved her hand to me, and I put my horse to
his speed. I had not gone far, however, before I perceived a fresh
cause of anxiety. She was making straight for a wire fence. I had heard
that horses could not see such a fence, and if Clara did not see it, or
should be careless, the result would be frightful. I shouted after her,
but she took no heed. Fortunately, however, there was right in front of
them a gate, which I had not at first observed, into the bars of which
had been wattled some brushwood. 'The mare will see that,' I said to
myself. But the words were hardly through my mind, before I saw them
fly over it like a bird.

On the other side, she pulled up, and waited for me.

Now I had never jumped a fence in my life. I did not know that my mare
could do such a thing, for I had never given her the chance. I was not,
and never have become, what would be considered an accomplished
horseman. I scarcely know a word of stable-slang. I have never followed
the hounds more than twice or three times in the course of my life. Not
the less am I a true lover of horses--but I have been their companion
more in work than in play. I have slept for miles on horseback, but
even now I have not a sure seat over a fence.

I knew nothing of the animal I rode, but I was bound, at least, to make
the attempt to follow my leader. I was too inexperienced not to put him
to his speed instead of going gently up to the gate; and I had a bad
habit of leaning forward in my saddle, besides knowing nothing of how
to incline myself backwards as the horse alighted. Hence when I found
myself on the other side, it was not on my horse's back, but on my own
face. I rose uninjured, except in my self-esteem. I fear I was for the
moment as much disconcerted as if I had been guilty of some moral
fault. Nor did it help me much towards regaining my composure that
Clara was shaking with suppressed laughter. Utterly stupid from
mortification, I laid hold of my horse, which stood waiting for me
beside the mare, and scrambled upon his back. But Clara, who, with all
her fun, was far from being ill-natured, fancied from my silence that I
was hurt. Her merriment vanished. With quite an anxious expression on
her face, she drew to my side, saying--

'I hope you are not hurt?'

'Only my pride,' I answered.

'Never mind that,' she returned gaily. 'That will soon be itself
again.'

'I'm not so sure,' I rejoined. 'To make such a fool of myself before
_you_!'

'Am I such a formidable person?' she said.

'Yes,' I answered. 'But I never jumped a fence in my life before.'

'If you had been afraid,' she said, 'and had pulled up, I might have
despised you. As it was, I only laughed at you. Where was the harm? You
shirked nothing. You followed your leader. Come along, I will give you
a lesson or two before we get back.'

'Thank you,' I said, beginning to recover my spirits a little; 'I shall
be a most obedient pupil. But how did you get so clever, Clara?'

I ventured the unprotected name, and she took no notice of the liberty.

'I told you I had had a riding-master. If you are not afraid, and mind
what you are told, you will always come right somehow.'

'I suspect that is good advice for more than horsemanship.'

'I had not the slightest intention of moralizing. I am incapable of
it,' she answered, in a tone of serious self-defence.

'I had as little intention of making the accusation,' I rejoined. 'But
will you really teach me a little?'

'Most willingly. To begin, you must sit erect. You lean forward.'

'Thank you. Is this better?'

'Yes, better. A little more yet. You ought to have your stirrups
shorter. It is a poor affectation to ride like a trooper. Their own
officers don't. You can tell any novice by his long leathers, his heels
down and his toes in his stirrups. Ride home, if you want to ride
comfortably.'

The phrase was new to me, but I guessed what she meant; and without
dismounting, pulled my stirrup-leathers a couple of holes shorter, and
thrust my feet through to the instep. She watched the whole proceeding.

'There! you look more like riding now,' she said. 'Let us have another
canter. I will promise not to lead you over any more fences without due
warning.'

'And due admonition as well, I trust, Clara.'

She nodded, and away we went. I had never been so proud of my mare. She
showed to much advantage, with the graceful figure on her back, which
she carried like a feather.

'Now there's a little fence,' she said, pointing where a rail or two
protected a clump of plantation. 'You must mind the young wood though,
or we shall get into trouble. Mind you throw yourself back a little--as
you see me do.'

I watched her, and following her directions, did better this time, for
I got over somehow and recovered my seat.

'There! You improve,' said Clara. 'Now we're pounded, unless you can
jump again, and it is not quite so easy from this side.'

When we alighted, I found my saddle in the proper place.

'Bravo!' she cried. 'I entirely forgive your first misadventure. You do
splendidly.'

'I would rather you forgot it, Clara,' I cried, ungallantly.

'Well, I will be generous,' she returned. 'Besides, I owe you something
for such a charming ride. I _will_ forget it.'

'Thank you,' I said, and drawing closer would have laid my left hand on
her right.

Whether she foresaw my intention, I do not know; but in a moment she
was yards away, scampering over the grass. My horse could never have
overtaken hers.

By the time she drew rein and allowed me to get alongside of her once
more, we were in sight: of Moldwarp Hall. It stood with one corner
towards us, giving the perspective of two sides at once. She stopped
her mare, and said,

'There, Wilfrid! What would you give to call a place like that your
own? What a thing to have a house like that to live in!'

[Illustration: "NOW THERE'S A LITTLE FENCE," SHE SAID.]

'I know something I should like better,' I said.

I assure my reader I was not so silly as to be on the point of making
her an offer already. Neither did she so misunderstand me. She was very
near the mark of my meaning when she rejoined--

'Do you? I don't. I suppose you would prefer being called a fine poet,
or something of the sort.'

I was glad she did not give me time to reply, for I had not intended to
expose myself to her ridicule. She was off again at a gallop towards
the Hall, straight for the less accessible of the two gates, and had
scrambled the mare up to the very bell-pull and rung it before I could
get near her. When the porter appeared in the wicket--

'Open the gate, Jansen,' she said. 'I want to see Mrs Wilson, and I
don't want to get down.'

'But horses never come in here, Miss,' said the man.

'I mean to make an exception in favour of this mare,' she answered.

The man hesitated a moment, then retreated--but only to obey, as we
understood at once by the creaking of the dry hinges, which were seldom
required to move.

'You won't mind holding her for me, will you?' she said, turning to me.

I had been sitting mute with surprise both at the way in which she
ordered the man, and at his obedience. But now I found my tongue.

'Don't you think, Miss Coningham,' I said--for the man was within
hearing, 'we had better leave them both with the porter, and then we
could go in together? I'm not sure that those flags, not to mention the
steps, are good footing for that mare.'

'Oh! you're afraid of your animal, are you?' she rejoined. 'Very well.'

'Shall I hold your stirrup for you?'

Before I could dismount, she had slipped off, and begun gathering up
her skirt. The man came and took the horses. We entered by the open
gate together.

'How can you be so cruel, Clara?' I said. 'You _will_ always
misinterpret me! I was quite right about the flags. Don't you see how
hard they are, and how slippery therefore for iron shoes?'

'You might have seen by this time that I know quite as much about
horses as you do,' she returned, a little cross, I thought.

'You can ride ever so much better,' I answered; 'but it does not follow
you know more about horses than I do. I once saw a horse have a
frightful fall on just such a pavement. Besides, does one think _only_
of the horse when there's an angel on his back?'

It was a silly speech, and deserved rebuke.

'I'm not in the least fond of _such_ compliments,' she answered.

By this time we had reached the door of Mrs Wilson's apartment. She
received us rather stiffly, even for her. After some commonplace talk,
in which, without departing from facts, Clara made it appear that she
had set out for the express purpose of paying Mrs Wilson a visit, I
asked if the family was at home, and finding they were not, begged
leave to walk into the library.

'We'll go together,' she said, apparently not caring about a
tete-a-tete with Clara. Evidently the old lady liked her as little as
ever.

We left the house, and entering again by a side door, passed on our way
through the little gallery, into which I had dropped from the roof.

'Look, Clara, that is where I came down,' I said.

She merely nodded. But Mrs Wilson looked very sharply, first at the
one, then at the other of us. When we reached the library, I found it
in the same miserable condition as before, and could not help
exclaiming with some indignation,

'It _is_ a shame to see such treasures mouldering there! I am confident
there are many valuable books among them, getting ruined from pure
neglect. I wish I knew Sir Giles. I would ask him to let me come and
set them right.'

'You would be choked with dust and cobwebs in an hour's time,' said
Clara. 'Besides, I don't think Mrs Wilson would like the proceeding.'

'What do you ground that remark upon, Miss Clara?' said the housekeeper
in a dry tone.

'I thought you used them for firewood occasionally,' answered Clara,
with an innocent expression both of manner and voice.

The most prudent answer to such an absurd charge would have been a
laugh; but Mrs Wilson vouchsafed no reply at all, and I pretended to be
too much occupied with its subject to have heard it.

After lingering a little while, during which I paid attention chiefly
to Mrs Wilson, drawing her notice to the state of several of the books,
I proposed we should have a peep at the armoury. We went in, and,
glancing over the walls I knew so well, I scarcely repressed an
exclamation: I could not be mistaken in my own sword! There it hung, in
the centre of the principal space--in the same old sheath, split
half-way up from the point! To the hilt hung an ivory label with a
number upon it. I suppose I made some inarticulate sound, for Clara
fixed her eyes upon me. I busied myself at once with a gorgeously hiked
scimitar, which hung near, for I did not wish to talk about it then,
and so escaped further remark. From the armoury we went to the
picture-gallery, where I found a good many pictures had been added to
the collection. They were all new and mostly brilliant in colour. I was
no judge, but I could not help feeling how crude and harsh they looked
beside the mellowed tints of the paintings, chiefly portraits, among
which they had been introduced.

'Horrid!--aren't they?' said Clara, as if she divined my thoughts; but
I made no direct reply, unwilling to offend Mrs Wilson.

When we were once more on horseback, and walking across the grass, my
companion was the first to speak.

'Did you ever see such daubs!' she said, making a wry face as at
something sour enough to untune her nerves. 'Those new pictures are
simply frightful. Any one of them would give me the jaundice in a week,
if it were hung in our drawing-room.'

'I can't say I admire them,' I returned. 'And at all events they ought
not to be on the same walls with those stately old ladies and
gentlemen.'

'Parvenus,' said Clara. 'Quite in their place. Pure Manchester
taste--educated on calico-prints.'

'If that is your opinion of the family, how do you account for their
keeping everything so much in the old style? They don't seem to change
anything.'

'All for their own honour and glory! The place is a testimony to the
antiquity of the family of which they are a shoot run to seed--and very
ugly seed too! It's enough to break one's heart to think of such a
glorious old place in such hands. Did you ever see young Brotherton?'

'I knew him a little at college. He's a good-looking fellow!'

'Would be if it weren't for the bad blood in him. That comes out
unmistakeably. He's vulgar.'

'Have you seen much of him, then?'

'Quite enough. I never heard him say anything vulgar, or saw him do
anything vulgar, but vulgar he is, and vulgar is every one of the
family. A man who is always aware of how rich he will be, and how
good-looking he is, and what a fine match he would make, would look
vulgar lying in his coffin.'

'You are positively caustic, Miss Coningham.'

'If you saw their house in Cheshire! But blessings be on the
place!--it's the safety-valve for Moldwarp Hall. The natural Manchester
passion for novelty and luxury finds a vent there, otherwise they could
not keep their hands off it; and what was best would be sure to go
first. Corchester House ought to be secured to the family by Act of
Parliament.'

'Have you been to Corchester, then?'

'I was there for a week once.'

'And how did you like it?'

'Not at all. I was not comfortable. I was always feeling too well-bred.
You never saw such colours in your life. Their drawing-rooms are quite
a happy family of the most quarrelsome tints.'

'How ever did they come into this property?'

'They're of the breed somehow--a long way off though. Shouldn't I like
to see a new claimant come up and oust them after all! They haven't had
it above five-and-twenty years or so. Wouldn't you?'

'The old man was kind to me once.'

'How was that? I thought it was only through Mrs Wilson you knew
anything of them.'

I told her the story of the apple.

'Well, I do rather like old Sir Giles,' she said, when I had done.
'There's a good deal of the rough country gentleman about him. He's a
better man than his son anyhow. Sons will succeed their fathers,
though, unfortunately.'

'I don't care who may succeed him, if only I could get back my sword.
It's too bad, with an armoury like that, to take my one little ewe-lamb
from me.'

Here I had another story to tell. After many interruptions in the way
of questions from my listener, I ended it with these words--

'And--will you believe me?--I saw the sword hanging in that armoury
this afternoon--close by that splendid hilt I pointed out to you.'

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