London Pride by M. E. Braddon

M >> M. E. Braddon >> London Pride

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Not a word was spoken on either side as they rode out at the gate and
through the village of St. Nicholas, beautiful in the moonlight. Such low
crumbling walls and deeply sloping roofs of cottages squatting in a tangle
of garden and orchard; such curious outlines of old brick gables in the
better class houses of miller, butcher, and general dealer; orchards and
gardens and farm buildings, with every variety of thatch and eaves, huddled
together in picturesque confusion; large spaces everywhere--pond, and
village green, and common, and copse beyond; a peaceful, prosperous
settlement, which had passed unharmed through the ordeal of the civil war,
safe in its rural seclusion. Not a word was spoken even when the village
was left behind, and they were riding on a lonely road, in so brilliant
a moonlight that Angela could see every line in her companion's brooding
face.

Why was he so gloomy and so unkind, in an hour when his sympathy should
naturally have been given to her? Was he consumed with sorrow for his
wife's indisposition, and did anxiety make him silent; or was he angry with
himself for not being as deeply distressed as a husband ought to be at
a wife's peril? She knew too well how he and Hyacinth had been growing
further apart day by day, till the only link between husband and wife
seemed to be a decent courtesy and subservience to the world's opinion.

She recalled that other occasion when they two had made a solitary journey
together, and in as gloomy a silence--that night of the great fire, when he
had flung off his doublet and taken the sculls out of her hands, and rowed
steadily and fast, with his eyes downcast, leaving her to steer the boat as
she would, or trusting to the lateness of the hour for a clear course. He
had seemed to hate her that night just as he seemed to hate her now, as
they rode mile after mile side by side, the groom following near, now at a
fast trot, now galloping along a stretch of waste grass that bordered the
highway, now breathing their horses in a walk.

In one of those intervals he asked her if she were tired.

"No, no. I have no power to feel anything but anxiety. If you would only
be kinder and tell me more about my sister! I fear you consider her in
danger."

"Yes, she is in danger. There is no doubt of that."

"O God! she looked so ill when I saw her last, and she talked so wildly. I
feared she was in a bad way. How soon shall we be at Chilton, my lord?"

"My lord! Why do you 'my lord' me?"

"I can find no other name. We seem to be strangers to-night; but, indeed,
names and ceremonies matter nothing when the mind is in trouble. How soon
shall we reach the Abbey, Fareham?"

"In an hour, at latest, Angela."

His voice trembled as he spoke her name, and all of force and passion that
could be breathed into a single word was in his utterance. She flushed at
the sound, and looked at him with a sudden fear; but his countenance might
have been wrought-iron, so cold and passionless and cruelly resolute looked
that rough-hewn face in the moonlight.

"I have a fresh horse waiting for you at Thame," he said. "I will not have
you wearied by riding a tired horse. We are within five minutes of the inn.
Will you rest there for half an hour, and take some refreshment?"

"Rest, when my sister may be dying! Not a moment more than is needed to
change horses."

"I have brought Queen Bess, another of your favourites. 'Twas she who
taught you to ride. She will know your voice, and your light hand upon her
bridle."

They found the Inn wrapped in slumber, like every house or cottage they had
passed; but a lantern shone within an open door in the quadrangle round
which house and stables were built. One of the Fareham grooms was there,
with an ostler to wait upon him, and three horses were brought out of their
stable, ready saddled, as the travellers rode under the archway into the
yard.

The mare was excited at finding herself on the road in the clear cool
night, with the moonlight in her eyes, and was gayer than Fareham liked to
see her under so precious a load; but Angela was no longer the novice by
whose side he had ridden nearly two years before. She handled Queen Bess
firmly, and soon settled her into a sharp trot, and kept her at it for
nearly three miles. The hour Fareham had spoken of was not exceeded by many
minutes when Chilton Abbey came in sight, the grey stone walls pale in the
moonlight. All things--the long park wall, the pillared gates, the open
spaces of the park, the depth of shadow where the old oaks and beeches
spread wide and dark, had a look of unreality which contrasted curiously
with the scene as she had last beheld it in all its daylight verdure and
homeliness.

She dropped lightly from her horse, so soon as they drew rein at an angle
of the long irregular house, where there was a door, half hidden under ivy,
by which Lord Fareham went in and out much oftener than by the principal
entrance. It opened into a passage that led straight to the library, where
there was a lamp burning to-night. Angela saw the light in the window as
they rode past.

He opened the door, which had been left on the latch, and nodded a
dismissal to the groom, who went off to the stables, leading their horses.
All was dark in the passage--dark and strangely silent; but this wing was
remote from the chief apartments and from the servants' offices.

"Will you take me to my sister at once?" Angela asked, stopping on the
threshold of the library, when Fareham had opened the door.

A lamp upon the tall mantelpiece feebly lighted the long low room, gloomy
with the darkness of old oak wainscot and a heavily timbered ceiling. There
were two flasks of wine upon a silver salver, and provisions for a supper,
and a fire was burning on the hearth.

"You had better warm yourself after your night ride, and eat and drink
something before you see her."

"No, no. What, after riding as fast as our horses could carry us! I must go
to her this moment. Can you find me a candle?"--looking about her hurriedly
as she spoke. "But, indeed, it is no matter; I know my way to her room in
the dark, and there will be light enough from the great window."

"Stop!" he cried, seizing her arm as she was leaving the room; "stop!"
dragging her back and shutting the door violently. "Your sister is not
there."

"Great God! what do you mean? You told me your wife was here--ill--dying
perhaps."

"I told you a lie, sweetheart; but desperate men will do desperate things."

"Where is my sister? Is she dead?"

"Not unless the Nemesis that waits on woman's folly has been swifter of
foot than common. I have no wife, Angela; and you have no sister that you
will ever care to own. My Lady Fareham has crossed the narrow sea with her
lover, Henri de Malfort--her paramour always--though I once thought him
yours, and tried to kill him for your sake."

"A runaway wife! Hyacinth! Great God!" She clasped her hands before her
face in an agony of shame and despair, falling upon her knees in sudden
self-abasement, her head drooping until her brow almost touched the ground.
And then, after but a few minutes of this deep humiliation, she started to
her feet with a cry of anger. "Liar! villain! despicable, devilish villain!
This is a lie, like the other--a wicked lie! Your wife--your wife a wanton?
My sister? My life upon it, she is in London--in your house, busy preparing
for my marriage. Unlock that door, my lord; let me go this instant--back to
my father. Oh, that I could be so mad as to leave his protection at your
bidding! Open the door, sir, I command you!"

She seemed to gain in height, and to be taller than he had thought her--he
who had so watched her, and whose memory held every line of that slender,
graceful figure. She stood straight as an arrow, looking at him with
set lips and flaming eyes, too angry to be afraid, trembling, but with
indignation, not fear of him.

"Nay, child," he said gravely, "I have got you, and I mean to keep you. But
you have trusted yourself to my hospitality, and you are safe in my house
as in a sanctuary. I may be a villain, but I am not a ruffian. If I have
brought you here by a trick, you are as much mistress of your life and fate
under this roof as you ever were in your father's house."

"I have but one thing to say, sir. Let me out of this hateful house."

"What then? Would you walk back to the Manor Moat, through the
night--alone?"

"I would crawl there on my hands and knees if I could not walk; anything to
get away from you. Oh, the baseness of it! To vilify my sister--for your
own base purposes. Intolerable villain!"

"Mistress, we will soon put an end to that charge. Lies there have been,
but that is none. 'Tis you are the slanderer there."

He took a letter from the pocket of his doublet, and handed it to her. Then
he took the lamp from the mantelshelf and held it while she read.

Alas, it was her sister's hand. She knew those hurried characters too well.
The letter was blotted with ink and smeared as with tears. Angela's tears
began to rain upon the page as she read:--

"I have tried to be a good woman and a true wife to you, tried hard for
these many years, knowing all the time that you had left off loving me,
and but for the shame of it would have cared little, though I had as many
lovers as a maid of honour. You made life harder for me in this year last
past by your passion for my sister, which mystery of yours, silent and
secret as you were, these eyes must have been blind not to discover.

"And while you were cold in manner and cruel of speech--slighting me
ever--there was one who loved and praised me, one whose value I knew not
till he left this country, and I found myself desolate without him.

"He has come back. He, too, has found that I was the other half of his
mind; and that he could taste no pleasure in life unshared by me. He has
come to claim one who ever loved him, and denied him only for virtue's
sake. Virtue! Poor fool that I was to count that a woman's noblest quality!
Why, of all attributes, it is that the world least values. Virtue! when the
starched Due de Montausier fawns upon Louise de la Valliere, when Barbara
Palmer is de facto Queen of England. Virtue!

"Farewell! Forget me, Fareham, as I shall try to forget you. I shall be
in Paris perhaps before you receive this letter. My house in the Rue de
Touraine is ready for me. I shall dishonour you by no open scandal. The man
I love will but rank as the friend I most value, and my other friends will
ask no questions so long as you are silent, and do not seek to disgrace me.
Indeed, it were an ill thing to pursue me with your anger; the more so as I
am weak and ailing, and may not live long to enjoy my happiness. You have
given me so little that you should in common justice spare me your hate.

"I leave you your children, whom you have affected to love better than I;
and who have shown so little consideration for me that I shall not miss
them."

* * * * *

"What think you of that, Angela, for the letter of a she-cynic?"

"It is blotted with her tears. She wrote in sorrow, despairing of your
love."

"She managed to exist for a round dozen years without my love--or doubting
it--so long as she had her _cavaliere servante_. It was only when he
deserted her that she found life a burden. And now she has crossed the
Rubicon. She belongs to her age--the age of Kings' mistresses and light
women. And she will be happy, I dare swear, as they are. It is not an age
of tears. And when the fair Louise ran away to her Convent the other day,
in a passion of penitence, be sure she only went on purpose to be brought
back again. But now, sweet, say have I lied to you about the lady who was
once my wife?" he asked, pointing to the letter in her hand.

"And who is my sister to the end of time; my sister in Eternity: in
Purgatory or in Paradise. I cannot cast her off, though you may. I will set
out for Paris to-morrow, and bring her home, if I can, to the Manor. She
need trouble you no more. My husband and I can shelter and pity her."

"Your husband!"

"He will be my husband a fortnight hence."

"Never! Never, while I live to fling my body between you at the altar.
His blood or mine should choke your marriage vows. Angela, Angela, be
reasonable. I have brought you out of that trap. I have cut the net in
which they had caught you. My love, you are free, and I am free, and you
belong to me. You never loved Denzil Warner, never would love him, were
you to live with him a quarter of a century. He is ice, and you are fire.
Dearest, you belong to me. He who made us both created us to be happy
together. There are strings in our hearts that harmonize as concords in
music do. We are miserable apart, both of us. We waste, and fade, and
torture ourselves in absence; but only to breathe the same air, to sit,
silent, in the same room, is to be happy."

"Let me go!" she cried, looking at him with wild eyes, leaning against the
locked door, her hands clutching at the latch, seeming neither to hear nor
heed his impassioned address, though every word had sunk deep enough to
remain in her memory for ever. "Let me go! You are a dishonourable villain!
I came to London alone to your deserted house. I was not afraid of death or
the plague then. I am not afraid of you now. Open this door, and let me go,
never to see your wicked face again!"

"Angela, canst thou so play fast and loose with happiness? Look at me,"
kneeling at her feet, trying to take her hands from their hold on the
latch. "Our fate is in our power to-night. The day is near dawning, and
at the stroke of five my coach will be at the door to take us to Bristol,
where the ship lies that shall carry us to New England--to a new world, and
liberty; and to the sweet simple life that will please my dear love better
than all the garish pleasures of a licentious court. Ah, dearest, I know
thy mind and heart as well as I know my own. I know I can make thee happy
in that fair new world, where we shall begin life again, free from all old
burdens; and where, if thou wilt, my motherless children can join us, and
make one loving household. My Henriette adores you; and it were Christian
charity to rescue her and her brother from Charles Stuart's England, and to
bring them up to an honest life in a country where men are free to worship
God as He moves them. Love, you cannot deny me. So sweet a life waits for
us; and you have but to lay that dear hand in mine and give consent."

"Oh, God!" she murmured. "I thought this man held me in honour and esteem."

"Do I not honour you? Ah, love, what can a man do more than offer his life
to her he loves----"

"And if he is another woman's husband?"

"That tie is broken."

"I deny it. But if it were, you have been my sister's husband, and you
could be nothing to me but my brother. You have made sisterly affection
impossible, and so, my lord, we must be strangers; and, as you are a
gentleman, I bid you open this door, and let me make my way to some more
peaceful shelter than your house."

"Angela!"

He tried to draw her to his breast; but she held him off with outstretched
arm, and even in the tumult of his passion the knowledge of her
helplessness and his natural shame at his own treachery kept him in check.

"Angela, call me villain if you will, but give me a fair hearing. Dearest,
the joy or sorrow of two lives lies in your choice to-night. If you will
trust me, and go with me, I swear I will make you happy. If you are
stubborn to refuse--well, sweetheart, you will but send a man to the devil
who is not wholly bad, and who, with you for his guardian angel, might find
the way to heaven."

"And begin the journey by a sin these lips dare not name. Oh, Fareham," she
said, growing suddenly calm and grave, and with something of that tender
maternal manner with which she had soothed and controlled him while he had
but half his wits, and when she feared he might be lying on his death-bed,
"I would rather believe you a madman than a villain; and, indeed, all that
you have done to-night is the work of a madman, who follows his own wild
fancy without power to reason on what he does. Surely, sir, you know me too
well to believe that I would let love--were it the blindest, most absorbing
passion woman ever felt--lead me into sin so base as that you would urge.
The vilest wanton at Whitehall would shrink from stealing a sister's
husband."

"There would be no theft. Your sister flings me to you as a dog drops the
bone he has picked dry. She had me when I was young, and a soldier--with
some reflected glory about me from the hero I followed--and rich and happy.
She leaves me old and haggard, without aim or hope, save to win her I
worship. Shall I tell you when I began to love you, my angel?"

"No, no; I will listen to no more raving. Thank God, there is the
daylight!" as the cold wan dawn flickered across the room. "Will you let me
beat my hands against this door till they bleed?"

"Thou shalt not harm the loveliest hands on earth," seizing them both in
his own. "Ah, sweet, I began to love thee before ever I rose from that bed
of horror where I had been left to perish. I loved thee in my unreason, and
my love strengthened with each hour of returning sense. Our journey, I so
weak, and sick, and helpless--was a ride through Paradise. I would have had
it last a year; would have suffered sickness and pain, aching limbs and
parched lips, only to feel the light touch of this dear hand upon my brow
'twixt sleep and waking; only to look up as I awoke, and see those sweet
eyes looking down at me. Ah, dearest, my heart arose from among the dead,
and came out of the tomb of all human affections to greet thee. Till I knew
you I knew not the meaning of love. And if you are stubborn, and will not
come with me to that new world, where we may be so happy, why, then I must
go down to my grave a despairing wretch that never knew a woman's love."

"My sister--your wife?"

"Never loved me. Her heart--that which she calls heart--was ever Malfort's
and not mine. She gave me to know as much by a hundred signs and tokens
which read plain enough now, looking back, but which I scarce heeded at the
time. I believed her chaste, and she was civil, and I was satisfied. I tell
you, Angela, this heart never beat for woman till I knew you. Ah, love, be
not stone! Make not our affinity an obstacle. The Roman Church will ever
grant dispensation for a union of affinities where there is cause for
indulgence. The Church would have had Philip married to his wife's sister
Elizabeth."

"The Church holds the bond of marriage indissoluble," Angela answered. "You
are married to my sister; and while she lives you can have no other wife."

Her brow was stern, her courage unfaltering; but physical force was failing
her. She leant against the door for support, and she no longer struggled
to withdraw her hands from that strong grasp which held them. She fought
against the faintness that was stealing over her senses; but her heavy
eyelids were beginning to droop, and there was a sound like rushing water
in her ears.

"Angela--Angela," pleaded the tender voice, "do you forget that afternoon
at the play, and how you wept over Bellario's fidelity--the fond girl-page
who followed him she loved; risked name and virtue; counted not the
cost, in that large simplicity of love which gives all it has to give,
unquestioning? Remember Bellario."

"Bellario had no thought that was not virtue's," she answered faintly; and
he took that fainter tone for a yielding will.

"She would not have left Philaster if he had been alone in the wilderness,
miserable for want of her love."

Her white lips moved dumbly, her eyelids sank, and her head fell back
upon his shoulder, as he started up from his knees to support her sinking
figure. She was in his arms, unconscious--the image of death.

He kissed her on the brow.

"My soul, I will owe nothing to thy helplessness," he whispered. "Thy free
will shall decide whether I live or die."

Another sound had mingled with the rushing waters as her senses left
her--the sound of knocking at a distant door. It grew louder and louder
momently, indicating a passionate impatience in those who knocked. The
sound came from the principal door, and there was a long corridor between
that door and Fareham's room.

He stood listening, undecided; and then he laid the unconscious form gently
on the thick Persian carpet--knowing that for recovery the fainting girl
could not lie too low. He cast one agitated glance at the white face
looking up at the ceiling, and then went quickly to the hall.

As he came near, the knocking began again, with greater vehemence, and a
voice, which he knew for Sir John's, called--

"Open the door, in the King's name, or we will break it open!"

There was a pause; those without evidently waiting for the result of that
last and loudest summons.

Fareham heard the hoofs of restless horses trampling the gravel drive, the
jingle of bit and chain, and the click of steel scabbards.

Sir John had not come alone.

"So soon; so devilish soon!" muttered Fareham. And then, as the knocking
was renewed, he turned and left the hall without a word of answer to those
outside, and hastened back to the room where he had left Angela. His brow
was fixed in a resolute frown, every nerve was braced. He had made up his
mind what to do. He had the house to himself, and was thus master of the
situation, so long as he could keep his pursuers on the outside. The upper
servants--half a dozen coach-loads--had been packed off to London, under
convoy of Manningtree and Mrs. Hubbock. The under servants--rank and
file--from housemaids to turnspits, slept in a huge barrack adjoining the
stables, built in Elizabeth's reign to accommodate the lower grade of a
nobleman's household. These would not come into the house to light fires
and sweep rooms till six o'clock at the earliest; and it was not yet four.
Lord Fareham, therefore, had to fear no interruption from his own people.

There was broad daylight in the house now; yet he looked about for a
candle; found one on a side-table, in a tall silver candlestick, and
stopped to light it, before he raised the lifeless figure from the floor
and lifted it into the easiest position for carrying, the head lying on his
shoulder. Then, holding the slender waist firmly, circled by his left arm,
he took the candlestick in his right hand, and went out of the room with
his burden, along a passage leading to a seldom-used staircase, which he
ascended, carrying that tall, slim form as if it had been a feather-weight,
up flight after flight, to the muniment room in the roof. From that point
his journey, and the management of that unconscious form, and to dispose
safely of the lighted candle, became more difficult, and occupied a
considerable time; during which interval the impatience of an enraged
father and a betrothed husband, outside the hall door, increased with every
minute of delay, and one of their mounted followers, of whom they had
several, was despatched to ride at a hand-gallop to the village of
Chilton, and rouse the Constable, while another was sent to Oxford for a
Magistrate's warrant to arrest Lord Fareham on the charge of abduction. And
meanwhile the battering upon thick oaken panels with stout riding-whips,
and heavy sword-hilts, and the calling upon those within, were repeated
with unabated vehemence, while a couple of horsemen rode round the house to
examine other inlets, and do picket duty.

The Constable and his underling were on the ground before that stubborn
citadel answered the reiterated summons; but at last there came the sound
of bolts withdrawn. An iron bar dropped from its socket with a clang that
echoed long and loud in the empty hall, the door opened, and Fareham
appeared on the threshold, corpse-like in the cold raw daylight, facing his
besiegers with a determined insolence.

"Thou most infernal villain!" cried Sir John, rushing into the hall,
followed closely by Denzil and one of the men, "what have you done with my
daughter?"

"Which daughter does your honour seek? If it be she whom you gave me for a
wife, she has broken the bond, and is across the sea with her paramour?"

"You lie--reprobate! Your wife had doubtless business relating to her
French estate, which called her to Paris. My daughters are honest women,
unless by your villainy, one, who should have been sacred, as your sister
by affinity, should bear a blighted name. Give me back my daughter,
villain--the girl you lured from her home by the foulest deceit!"

"You cannot see the lady to-day, gentlemen; even though you threaten me
with your weapons," pointing with a sardonic smile to their drawn swords,
"and out-number me with your followers. The lady is gone. I am alone in the
house to submit to any affront your superior force may put upon me."

"Our superiority can at least search your house," said Denzil. "Sir John,
you had best take one way and I another. I doubt I know every room and
passage in the Abbey."

"And your yeoman's manners offer a handsome return for the hospitality
which made you acquainted with my house," said Fareham, with a contemptuous
laugh.

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