CHAPTER LVI
Arthur did not delay his departure from Madeira. The morning followingMildred's ball he embarked on board a Portuguese boat, a very dirtycraft which smelt of garlic and rancid oil, and sailed for Lisbon. Hearrived there safely, and mooned about that city for a while, himselfa monument of serious reflections, and then struck across into Spain,where he spent a month or so inspecting the historical beauties ofthat fallen country. Thence he penetrated across the Pyrenees intoSouthern France, which was pleasant in the spring months. Here heremained another month, meeting with no adventures worthy of any note,and improving his knowledge of the French language. Tiring at last ofthis, he travelled to Paris, and went to the theatres, but found hisown thoughts too absorbing to allow of his taking any keen interest intheir sensationalisms; so, after a brief stay, he made his way up toBrittany and Normandy, and went in for inspecting old castles andcathedrals, and finally ended up his continental travels by spending aweek on the island rock of Saint Michel.
This place pleased him more than any he had visited. He liked towander about among the massive granite pillars of that nobleecclesiastical fortress, and at night to watch the phosphoric tidecome rushing in with all the speed of a race-horse, over the widesands, which separate it from the mainland. There the thirty-first dayof May found him, and he bethought him that it was time to return toLondon and see about getting the settlements drawn and ordering thewedding bouquet. To speak the truth, he thought more about the bouquetthan the settlements.
He arrived in London on the first of June, and went to see his familylawyer, a certain Mr. Borley, who had been solicitor to the trustduring his minority.
"Bless me, Heigham, how like your father you have grown!" said thatlegal gentleman, as soon as Arthur was ensconced in the client's chair--a chair that, had it been endowed with the gift of speech, couldhave told some surprising stories. "It seems only the other day thathe was sitting there dictating the terms of his will, and yet that wasbefore the Crimean war, more than twenty years ago. Well, my boy, whatis it?"
Arthur, thus encouraged, entered into a rather blundering recital ofthe circumstances of his engagement.
Mr. Borley did not say much, but, from his manner and occasionalcomments, it was evident that he considered the whole story very odd--regarding it, indeed, with some suspicion.
"I must tell you frankly, Mr. Heigham," he said, at last, "I don'tquite understand this business. The young lady, no doubt, is charming--young ladies, looking at them from my clients' point of view, alwaysare--but I can't say I like your story about her father. Why did younot tell me all this before? I might then have been able to give yousome advice worth having, or, at any rate, to make a few confidential"--he laid great emphasis on the word "confidential"--"inquiries."
Arthur replied that it had not occurred to him to do so.
"Umph, pity--great pity; but there is no time for that sort of thingnow, if you think you are going to get married on the tenth; so Isuppose the only thing to do is to go through with it and await theupshot. What do you wish done?"
Arthur explained his views, which apparently included settling all hisproperty on his bride in the most absolute fashion possible. To thisMr. Borley forcibly objected, and in the end Arthur had to give wayand make such arrangements as the old gentleman thought proper--arrangements differing considerably from those proposed by himself.
This interview over, he had other and pleasanter duties to perform,such as ordering his wedding clothes, making arrangements with aflorist for the bridal bouquet, and last, but not least, having hismother's diamonds re-set as a present for his bride.
But still the days went very slowly, there seemed to be no end tothem. He had no relations to go and see, and in his present anxiousexcited state he preferred to avoid his friends and clubacquaintances. Fifth, sixth, seventh; never did a schoolboy await thecoming of the day that marked the advent of his holidays with suchintense anxiety.
At length the eighth of June arrived. Months before, he had settledwhat his programme should be on that day. His promise, as the readermay remember, forbade him to see Angela till the ninth, that is, atany hour after twelve on the night of the eighth, or, practically, asearly as possible on the following morning. Now the earliest trainwould not get him down to Roxham till eleven o'clock, which wouldinvolve a wicked waste of four or five hours of daylight that might bespent with Angela, so he wisely resolved to start on the evening ofthe eighth, by a train leaving Paddington at six o'clock, and reachingRoxham at nine.
The day he spent in signing the settlements, finally interviewing theflorist, and giving him directions as to forwarding the wedding-bouquet, which was to be composed of orange-blossoms, lilies of thevalley, and stephanois, and in getting the marriage-license. But,notwithstanding these manifold employments, he managed to be three-quarters of an hour before his train, the longest forty-five minuteshe ever spent.
He had written to the proprietor of the inn at Rewtham, where he hadslept a year ago the night after he had left Isleworth, to send a gigto meet him at the station, and, on arriving at Roxham, a porter toldhim that a trap was waiting for him. On emerging from the station,even in the darkness, he was able to recognize the outlines of theidentical vehicle which had conveyed him to the Abbey House somethirteen months ago, whilst the sound of an ancient, quavering voiceinformed him that the Jehu was likewise the same. His luggage was soonbundled up behind, and the steady-going old nag departed into thedarkness.
"Well, Sam, do you remember me?"
"Well, no, sir, I can't rightly say how I do: wait a bit; bean't youthe gemman as travels in the dry line, and as I seed a-kissing thechambermaid?"
"No, I don't travel at present, and I have not kissed a chambermaidfor some time. Do you remember driving a gentleman over to the AbbeyHouse a year or so ago?"
"Why, yes, in course I does. Lord, now, and be you he? and we seed oldDevil's Caresfoot's granddaughter. Ah! many's the time that he hasdamned me, and all so soft and pleasant like; but it was his eyes thatdid the trick. They was awful, just awful; and you gave me half-a-crown, you did. But somehow I thought I heard summat about you, sir,but I can't rightly remember what it be, my head not being so good asit used to."
"Perhaps you heard what I was going to be married?"
"No. I don't think how as it was that neither."
"Well, never mind me; have you seen Miss Caresfoot--the young lady yousaw the day you drove me to the Abbey House--anywhere about lately?"
Arthur waited for the old man's lingering answer with all his heartupon his lips.
"Lor', yes, sir, that I have; I saw her this morning driving throughthe Roxham market-place."
"And how did she look?"
"A bit pale, I thought, sir; but well enough, and wonnerful handsome."
Arthur gave a sigh of relief. He felt like a man who has just comescatheless through some horrible crisis, and once more knows the sweetsensation of safety. What a load the old man's words had lifted fromhis mind? In his active imagination he had pictured all sorts of evilswhich might have happened to Angela during his year of absence. Loversare always prone to such imaginings, and not altogether withoutreason, for there would seem to be a special power of evil thatdevotes itself to the derangement of their affairs, and the ingeniousdisappointment of their hopes. But now the vague dread was gone,Angela was not spirited away or dead, and to know her alive was toknow her faithful.
As they drove along, the old ostler continued to volunteer variousscraps of information which fell upon his ears unheeded, tillpresently his attention was caught by the name Caresfoot.
"What about him?" he asked, quickly.
"He be a-dying, they do say."
"Which of them?"
"Why, the red-haired one, him as lives up at the Hall yonder."
"Poor fellow," said Arthur, feeling quite fond of George in hishappiness.
They had by this time reached the inn, where he had some supper, forold Sam's good news had brought back hi
s appetite, which of late hadnot been quite up to par, and then went straight to his room thatfaced towards the Abbey House. It was, he noticed, the same in whichhe had slept the year before, and looking at the bed he remembered hisdream, and smiled as he thought that the wood was passed, and beforehim lay nothing but the flowery meadows. Mildred Carr, too, crossedhis mind, but of her he did not think much, not that he was by anymeans heartless--indeed, what had happened had pained him acutely, themore so because his own conscience told him he had been a fool. He wasvery sorry, but, love being here below one of the most selfish of thepassions, he had not time to be sorry just then.
For just on the horizon he could distinguish a dense mass which wasthe trees surrounding the Abbey House, and between the trees thereglimmered a faint light which might proceed from some rising star, orfrom Angela's window. He preferred to believe it was the latter. Thepropinquity made him very happy. What was she doing? he wondered--sitting by her window and thinking of him! He would ask her on themorrow. It was worth while going through that year of separation inorder to taste the joy of meeting. It seemed like a dream to thinkthat within six-and-thirty hours he would probably be Angela'shusband, and how nobody in the world would be able to take her awayfrom him. He stretched out his arms towards her.
"My darling, my darling," he cried aloud into the still night. "Mydarling, my darling," the echo answered sadly.