The Case of Richard Meynell by Mrs. Humphry Ward

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* * * * *

"That comes, you see, of not letting me be engaged to Stephen!" said
Hester in a white heat, as the three walked on together.

Mary looked at her in astonishment.

"I see no connection," was the Rector's quiet reply. "You know very well
that your mother does not approve of Sir Philip Meryon, and does not wish
you to be in his company."

"Precisely. But as I am not to be allowed to marry Stephen, I must of
course amuse myself with some one else. If I can't be engaged to Stephen,
I won't be anything at all to him. But, then, I don't admit that I'm
bound."

"At present all you're asked"--said Meynell dryly--"is not to disobey
your mother. But don't you think it's rather rude to Miss Elsmere to be
discussing private affairs she doesn't understand?"

"Why shouldn't she understand them? Mary, my guardian here and my mother
say that I mustn't be engaged to Stephen Barron--that I'm too young--or
some nonsense of that kind. And Stephen--oh, well, Stephen's too good for
this world! If he really loved me, he'd do something desperate, wouldn't
he?--instead of giving in. I don't much mind, myself--I don't really care
so much about marrying Stephen--only if I'm not to marry him, and
somebody else wants to please me, why shouldn't I let him?"

She turned her beautiful wild eyes upon Mary Elsmere. And as she
did so Mary was suddenly seized with a strong sense of likeness in the
speaker--her gesture--her attitude--to something already familiar. She
could not identify the something, but her gaze fastened itself on the
face before her.

Meynell meanwhile answered Hester's tirade.

"I'm quite ready to talk this over with you, Hester, on our way home. But
don't you see that you are making Miss Elsmere uncomfortable?"

"Oh, no, I'm not," said Hester coolly. "You've been talking to her of
all sorts of grave, stupid things--and she wants amusing--waking up.
I know the look of her. Don't you?" She slipped her arm inside Mary's.
"You know, if you'd only do your hair a little differently--fluff it out
more--you'd be so pretty! Let me do it for you. And you shouldn't wear
that hat--no, you really shouldn't. It's a brute! I could trim you
another in half an hour. Shall I? You know--I really like you. _He_
sha'n't make us quarrel!"

She looked with a young malice at Meynell. But her brow had smoothed, and
it was evident that her temper was passing away.

"I don't agree with you at all about my hat," said Mary with spirit. "I
trimmed it myself, and I'm extremely proud of it."

Hester laughed out--a laugh that rang through the trees.

"How foolish you are!--isn't she, Rector? No!--I suppose that's just what
you like. I wonder what you _have_ been talking to her about? I shall
make her tell me. Where are you going to?"

She paused, as Mary and the Rector, at a point where two paths converged,
turned away from the path which led back to Upcote Minor. Mary explained
again that Mr. Meynell and she were on the way to the Forked Pond
cottage, where the Rector wished to call upon her mother.

Hester looked at her gravely.

"All right!--but your mother won't want to see me. No!--really it's no
good your saying she will. I saw her in the village yesterday. I'm not
her sort. Let me go home by myself."

Mary half laughed, half coaxed her into coming with them. But she went
very unwillingly; fell completely silent, and seemed to be in a dream all
the way to the cottage. Meynell took no notice of her; though once or
twice she stole a furtive look toward him.

* * * * *

The tiny house in which Catharine Elsmere and her daughter had settled
themselves for the summer stood on a narrow isthmus of land belonging to
the Maudeley estate, between the Sandford trout-stream and a large rushy
pond of two or three acres. It was a very lonely and a very beautiful
place, though the neighbourhood generally pronounced it damp and
rheumatic. The cottage, sheltered under a grove of firs, looked straight
out on the water, and over a bed of water-lilies. All round was a summer
murmur of woods, the call of waterfowl, and the hum of bees; for, at the
edges of the water, flowers and grasses pushed thickly out into the
sunlight from the shadow of the woods.

By the waterside, with a book on her knee, sat a lady who rose as they
came in sight.

Meynell approached her, hat in hand, his strong irregular face, which had
always in it a touch of _naivete_, of the child, expressing both timidity
and pleasure. The memory of her husband was enshrined deep in the minds
of all religious liberals; and it was known to many that while the
husband and wife had differed widely in opinion, and the wife had
suffered profoundly from the husband's action, yet the love between them
had been, from first to last, a perfect and a sacred thing.

He saw a tall woman, very thin, in a black dress. Her brown hair, very
lightly touched with gray and arranged with the utmost simplicity, framed
a face in which the passage of years had emphasized and sharpened all
the main features, replacing also the delicate smoothness of youth by a
subtle network of small lines and shadows, which had turned the original
whiteness of the skin into a brownish ivory, full of charm. The eyes
looked steadily out from their deep hollows; the mouth, austere and
finely cut, the characteristic hands, and the unconscious dignity of
movement--these personal traits made of Elsmere's wife, even in late
middle age, a striking and impressive figure.

Yet Meynell realized at once, as she just touched his offered hand, that
the sympathy and the homage he would so gladly have brought her would be
unwelcome; and that it was a trial to her to see him.

He sat down beside her, while Mary and Hester--who, on her introduction
to Mrs. Elsmere, had dropped a little curtsey learnt at a German school,
and full of grace--wandered off a little way along the water-side.
Meynell, struggling with depression, tried to make conversation--on
anything and everything that was not Upcote Minor, its parish, or its
church. Mrs. Elsmere's gentle courtesy never failed; yet behind it he was
conscious of a steely withdrawal of her real self from any contact with
his. He talked of Oxford, of the great college where he had learnt from,
the same men who had been Elsmere's teachers; of current books, of the
wild flowers and birds of the Chase; he did his best; but never once
was there any living response in her quiet replies, even when she smiled.

He said to himself that she had judged him, and that the judgments of
such a personality once formed were probably irrevocable. Would she
discourage any acquaintance with her daughter? It startled him to feel
how much the unspoken question hurt.

Meanwhile the eyes of his hostess pursued the two girls, and she
presently called to them, greeting their reappearance with an evident
change and relaxation of manner. She made Hester sit near her, and it was
not long before the child, throwing off her momentary awe, was chattering
fast and freely, yet, as Mary perceived, with a tact, conscious or
unconscious, that kept the chatter within bounds.

Mrs. Elsmere watched the girl's beauty with evident delight, and when
Meynell rose to go, and Hester with him, she timidly drew the radiant
creature to her and kissed her. Hester opened her big eyes with surprise.

Catharine Elsmere sat silent a moment watching the two departing figures;
then as Mary found a place in the grass beside her, she said, with some
constraint:

"You walked with him from Maudeley?"

"Mr. Meynell? Yes, I found him there at tea. He was very anxious to pay
his respects to you; so I brought him."

"I can't imagine why he should have thought it necessary."

Mary colored brightly and suddenly, under the vivacity of the tone. Then
she slipped her hand into her mother's.

"You didn't mind, dearest? Aunt Rose likes him very much, and--and I
wanted him to know you!" She smiled into her mother's eyes. "But we
needn't see him anymore if--"

Mrs. Elsmere interrupted her.

"I don't wish to be rude to any friend of Aunt Rose's," she said, rather
stiffly. "But there is no need we should see him, is there?"

"No," said Mary; her cheek dropped against her mother's knee, her eyes on
the water. "No--not that I know of." After a moment she added with
apparent inconsequence, "You mean because of his opinions?"

Catharine gave a rather hard little laugh.

"Well, of course he and I shouldn't agree; I only meant we needn't go out
of our way--"

"Certainly not. Only I can't help meeting him sometimes!"

Mary sat up, smiling, with her hands round her knees.

"Of course."

A pause. It was broken by the mother--as though reluctantly.

"Uncle Hugh was here while you were away. He told me about the service
last Sunday. Your father would never--never--have done such a thing!"

The repressed passion with which the last words were spoken startled
Mary. She made no reply, but her face, now once more turned toward the
sunlit pond, had visibly saddened. Inwardly she found herself asking--"If
father had lived?--if father were here now?"

Her reverie was broken by her mother's voice--softened--breathing
a kind of compunction.

"I daresay he's a good sort of man."

"I think he is," said Mary, simply.

They talked no more on the subject, and presently Catharine Elsmere rose,
and went into the house.

Mary sat on by the water-side thinking. Meynell's aspect, Meynell's
words, were in her mind--little traits too and incidents of his
parochial life that she had come across in the village. A man might
preach and preach, and be a villain! But for a man--a hasty, preoccupied,
student man--so to live, through twenty years, among these vigorous,
quick-tempered, sharp-brained miners, as to hold the place among them
Richard Meynell held, was not to be done by any mere pretender, any
spiritual charlatan. How well his voice pleased her!--his tenderness to
children--his impatience--his laugh.

The thoughts, too, he had expressed to her on their walk ran kindling
through her mind. There were in her many half-recognized thirsts and
desires of the spirit that seemed to have become suddenly strong and
urgent under the spur of his companionship.

She sat dreaming; then her mother called her to the evening meal, and she
went in. They passed the evening together, in the free and tender
intimacy which was their habitual relation. But in the mind of each there
were hidden movements of depression or misgiving not known to the other.

Meanwhile the Rector had walked home with his ward. A stormy business!
For much as he disliked scolding any young creature, least of all,
Hester, the situation simply could not be met without a scolding--by
Hester's guardian. Disobedience to her mother's wishes; disloyalty toward
those who loved her, including himself; deceit, open and unabashed, if
the paradox may be allowed--all these had to be brought home to her. He
talked, now tenderly, now severely, dreading to hurt her, yet hoping to
make his blows smart enough to be remembered. She was not to make friends
with Sir Philip Meryon. She was not to see him or walk with him. He was
not a fit person for her to know; and she must trust her elders in the
matter.

"You are not going to make us all anxious and miserable, dear Hester!" he
said at last, hoping devoutly that he was nearly through with his task.
"Promise me not to meet this man any more!" He looked at her appealingly.

"Oh, dear, no, I couldn't do that," said Hester cheerfully.

"Hester!"

"I couldn't. I never know what I shall want to do. Why should I promise?"

"Because you are asked to do so by those who love you, and you ought to
trust them."

Hester shook her head.

"It's no good promising. You'll have to prevent me."

Meynell was silent a moment. Then he said, not without sternness:

"We shall of course prevent you, Hester, if necessary. But it would be
far better if you took yourself in hand."

"Why did you stop my being engaged to Stephen?" she cried, raising her
head defiantly.

He saw the bright tears in her eyes, and melted at once.

"Because you are too young to bind yourself, my child. Wait a while, and
if in two years you are of the same mind, nobody will stand in your way."

"I sha'n't care a rap about him in two years," said Hester vehemently. "I
don't care about him now. But I should have cared about him if I had been
engaged to him. Well, now, you and mamma have meddled--and you'll see!"

They were nearing the opening of the lane which led from the main road to
North Leigh, Lady Fox-Wilton's house. As she perceived it Hester suddenly
took to flight, and her light form was soon lost to view in the summer
dusk.

The Rector did not attempt to pursue her. He turned back toward the
Rectory, perturbed and self-questioning. But it was not possible, after
all, to set a tragic value on the love affair of a young lady who, within
a week of its breaking off, had already consoled herself with another
swain. Anything less indicative of a broken heart than Hester's behaviour
during that week the Rector could not imagine. Personally he believed
that she spoke the simple truth when she said she no longer cared for
Stephen. He did not believe she ever had cared for him.

Still he was troubled, and on his way toward the Rectory he turned aside.
He knew that on his table he should find letters waiting that would take
him half the night. But they must lie there a bit longer. At Miss
Puttenham's gate he paused, hesitated a moment, then went straight into
the twilight garden, where he imagined that he should find its mistress.

He found her, in a far corner, among close-growing trees and with her
usual occupations, her books and her embroidery, beside her. But she was
neither reading nor sewing. She sprang up to greet him, and for an hour
of summer twilight they held a rapid, low-voiced conversation.

When he pressed her hand at parting they looked at each other, still
overshadowed by the doubt and perplexity which had marked the opening of
their interview. But he tried to reassure her.

"Put from you all idea of immediate difficulty," he said earnestly.
"There really is none--none at all. Stephen is perfectly reasonable, and
as for the escapade to-day--"

The woman before him shook her head.

"She means to marry at the earliest possible moment--simply to escape
from Edith--and that house. We sha'n't delay it long. And who knows what
may happen if we thwart her too much?"

"We _must_ delay it a year or two, if we possibly can--for her sake--and
for yours," said Meynell firmly. "Good night, my dear friend. Try and
sleep--put the anxiety away. When the moment comes--and of course I admit
it must come--you will reap the harvest of the love you have sown. She
does love you!--I am certain of that."

He heard a low sound--was it a sobbing breath?--as Alice Puttenham
disappeared in the darkness which had overtaken the garden.

CHAPTER V

Breakfast at the White House, Upcote Minor, was an affair of somewhat
minute regulation.

About a fortnight after Mr. Barron's call on the new tenants of Maudeley
Hall, his deaf daughter Theresa entered the dining-room as usual on the
stroke of half-past eight. She glanced round her to see that all was in
order, the breakfast table ready, and the chairs placed for prayers. Then
she went up to a side-table on which was placed a large Bible and
prayer-book and a pile of hymn-books. She looked at the lessons and
psalms for the day and placed markers in the proper places. Then she
chose a hymn, and laid six open hymn-books one upon another. After which
she stood for a moment looking at the first verse of the psalm for the
day: "I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my
help." The verse was one of her favourites, and she smiled vaguely, like
one who recognizes in the distance a familiar musical phrase.

Theresa Barron was nearly thirty. She had a long face with rather high
cheek-bones, and timid gray eyes. Her complexion was sallow, her figure
awkward. Her only beauty indeed lay in a certain shy and fleeting charm
of expression, which very few people noticed. She passed generally for a
dull and plain woman, ill-dressed, with a stoop that was almost a
deformity, and a deafness that made her socially useless. But the young
servants whom she trained, and the few poor people on her father's estate
to whom she was allowed to minister, were very fond of "Miss Theresa."
But for her, the owner of Upcote Minor Park would have been even more
unpopular than he was, indoors and out. The wounds made by his brusque or
haughty manner to his inferiors were to a certain extent healed by the
gentleness and the good heart of his daughter. And a kind of glory was
reflected on him by her unreasoning devotion to him. She suffered under
his hardness or his self-will, but she adored him all the time; nor was
her ingenuity ever at a loss for excuses for him. He always treated her
carelessly, sometimes contemptuously; but he would not have known how to
get through life without her, and she was aware of it.

On this August morning, having rung the bell for the butler, she placed
the Bible and prayer-book beside her father's chair, and opening the door
between the library and the dining-room, she called, "Papa!"

Through the farther door into the hall there appeared a long procession
of servants, headed by the butler, majestically carrying the tea-urn.
Something in this daily procession, and its urn-bearer, had once
sent Stephen Barron, the eldest son--then an Eton boy just home from
school--into an uncontrollable fit of laughter, which had cost him his
father's good graces for a week. But the procession had been in no way
affected, and at this later date Stephen on his visits home took it as
gravely as anybody else.

The tea-urn, pleasantly hissing, was deposited on the white cloth; the
servants settled themselves on their chairs, while Theresa distributed
the open hymn-books amongst them; and when they were all seated, the
master of the house, like a chief actor for whom the stage waits,
appeared from the library.

He read a whole chapter from the Bible. It told the story of Gehazi, and
he read it with an emphasis which the footman opposite to him secretly
though vaguely resented; then Theresa at the piano played the hymn,
in which the butler and the scullery-maid supported the deep bass of Mr.
Barron and the uncertain treble of his daughter. The other servants
remained stolidly silent, the Scotch cook in particular looking straight
before her with dark-spectacled eyes and a sulky expression. She was
making up her mind that either she must be excused from prayers in
future, or Mr. Barron must be content with less cooking for breakfast.

After the hymn, the prayer lasted about ten minutes. Stephen, a fervently
religious mind, had often fidgeted under the minute and detailed
petitions of it, which seemed to lay down the Almighty's precise course
of action toward mankind in general for the ensuing day. But Theresa, who
was no less spiritual, under other forms, took it all simply and
devoutly, and would have been uncomfortable if any item in the long
catalogue had been omitted. When the Amen came, the footman, who never
knew what to do with his legs during the time of kneeling, sprang up with
particular alacrity.

As soon as the father and daughter were seated at breakfast--close
together, for the benefit of Theresa's deafness--Mr. Barron opened the
post-bag and took out the letters. They arrived half an hour before
breakfast, but were not accessible to any one till the master of the
house had distributed them.

Theresa looked up from hers with an exclamation.

"Stephen hopes to get over for dinner to-night!"

"Unfortunate--as I may very probably not see him," said her father,
sharply. "I am going to Markborough, and may have to stay the night!"

"You are going to see the Bishop?" asked his daughter, timidly. Her
father nodded, adding after a minute, as he began upon his egg:

"However, I must have some conversation with Stephen before long. He
knows that I have not felt able to stay my hand to meet his wishes; and
perhaps now he will let me understand a little more plainly than I do,
what his own position is."

The speaker's tone betrayed bitterness of feeling. Theresa looked pained.

"Father, I am sure--"

"Don't be sure of anything, my dear, with regard to Stephen! He has
fallen more and more under Meynell's influence of late, and I more than
suspect that when the time comes he will take sides openly with him. It
will be a bitter blow to me, but that he doesn't consider. I don't expect
consideration from him, either as to that--or other things. Has he been
hanging round the Fox-Wiltons lately as usual?"

Theresa looked troubled.

"He told me something the other night, father, I ought to have told you.
Only--"

"Only what? I am always kept in the dark between you."

"Oh, no, father! but it seems to annoy you, when--when I talk about
Stephen, so I waited. But the Rector and Lady Fox-Wilton have quite
forbidden any engagement between Stephen and Hester. Stephen _did_
propose--and they said--not for two years at least."

"You mean to say that Stephen actually was such a fool?" said her father
violently, staring at her.

Theresa nodded.

"A girl of the most headstrong and frivolous character!--a trouble to
everybody about her. Lady Fox-Wilton has often complained to me that she
is perfectly unmanageable with her temper and her vanity! The worst
conceivable wife for a clergyman! Really, Stephen--"

The master of the house pushed his plate away from him in speechless
disgust.

"And both Lady Fox-Wilton and the Rector have always taken such trouble
about her--much more than about the other children!" murmured Theresa,
helplessly.

"What sort of a bringing up do you think Meynell can give anybody?" said
her father, turning upon her.

Theresa only looked at him silently, with her large mild eyes. She knew
it was of no use to argue. Besides, on the subject of the Rector she very
much agreed with her father. Her deafness and her isolation had entirely
protected her from Meynell's personal influence.

"A man with no religious principles--making a god of his own
intellect--steeped in pride and unbelief--what can he do to train a girl
like Hester? What can he do to train himself?" thundered Barron, bringing
his hand down on the table-cloth.

"Every one says he is a good man," said Theresa, timidly.

"In outward appearance. What's that? A man like Meynell, who has thrown
over the Christian faith, may fall into sin at any moment. His unbelief
is the result of sin. He can neither help himself--nor other people--and
you need never be surprised to find that his supposed goodness is a mere
sham and delusion. I don't say it is always so, of course," he added.

Theresa made no reply, and the subject dropped. Barron returned to his
letters, and presently Theresa saw his brow darken afresh over one of
them.

"Anything wrong, father?"

"There's always something wrong on this estate. Crawley [Crawley was the
head keeper] has caught those boys of John Broad again trespassing and
stealing wood in the west plantation! Perfectly abominable! It's the
second or third time. I shall give Broad notice at once, and we must put
somebody into that cottage who will behave decently!"

"Poor Broad!" said Theresa, with her gentle, scared look. "You know,
father, there isn't a cottage to be had in the village--and those boys
have no mother--and John works very hard."

"Let him find another cottage all the same," said Barron briefly. "I
shall go round, if I do get back from Markborough, and have a talk with
him this evening."

There was silence for a little. Theresa was evidently sad. "Perhaps Lady
Fox-Wilton would find him something," she said anxiously at last. "His
mother was her maid long ago. First she was their schoolroom maid--then
she went back to them, when her husband died and John married, and was a
kind of maid housekeeper. Nobody knew why Lady Fox-Wilton kept her so
long. They tell you in the village she had a shocking temper, and wasn't
at all a good servant. Afterward I believe she went to America and I
think she died. But she was with them a long while. I daresay they'd do
something for John."

Barron made no reply. He had not been listening, and was already deep in
other correspondence.

One letter still remained unopened. Theresa knew very well that it was
from her brother Maurice, in London. And presently she pushed it toward
Barron.

"Won't you open it? I do want to know if it's all right."

Barron opened it, rather unwillingly. His face cleared, however, as he
read it.

"Not a bad report. He seems to like the work, and says they treat him
kindly. He would like to come down for the Sunday--but he wants some
money."

"He oughtn't to!" cried Theresa, flushing. "You gave him plenty."

"He makes out an account," said her father, glancing at the letter; "I
shall send him a small cheque. I must say, Theresa, you are always rather
inclined to a censorious temper toward your brother."

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