A Heart-Song of To-day Part 15

"Yes, Dover has been deserted for Surrey; and the untiring little, baronet follows in a month, and confided to me that he would be at my uncle's to welcome us."

"The plot thickens," laughed Roland.

"But Roland Douglas," said Lady Esmondet, "he should be there; he belongs, in some sort of way, to the wife of the Lord of the Manor, in a 'do-as-I-bid-you' kind of way; in their relations towards each other, one sees the advertis.e.m.e.nt for a person to 'make himself generally useful,' clearly defined; fashionable women of to-day affect such relations with men, and I suppose it is all right, as fashion has made it orthodox.'"

"We find it a too pleasant fashion to object to it," answered Bertram; "still rumour has it that Mrs. Haughton has been a great flirt, and if I were in Haughton's shoes, I should turn the cold shoulder to this Everly, or any other man; should they stay much at the Hall, time may, with the ponderous hospitalities of the county, hang heavy to one who has lived at New York pace, and just for pastime, she may flirt."

"I should think no woman married to Col. Haughton could, or would, think to kill time with any other man," said Vaura, warmly, a slight curl on her perfect lips.

"Bravo, Vaura," said her G.o.dmother; "a woman is of very slight value if, when she marry a man worth going to the altar with, she, after a few moons wane, looks about like Moore's 'Lesbia,' for some one to keep _ennui_ at bay."

"Hear, hear," said Bertram; "but to-day we have so many marriages of convenience that the society of some affinity is sought for distraction's sake."

"It's awfully nice to have an affinity for some one else's wife; but, by Jove," said Douglas, "if I were married, and caught a fellow hanging about my wife, I'd just want to handle one of Vulcan's heaviest, and tap him on the head."

"Spoken like a Briton on his preserves," laughed Vaura.

"How these fellows without an income manage to keep to the front is more than I can tell," said Douglas; "now, this Everly, though he doesn't exactly wax fat and shine, he isn't one of the lean kine either."

"I bet my life," said Bertram, "he is angling in his aunt's flower garden for a gold-fish."

"A boarding school would be a good field," said Lady Esmondet.

"Just the spot," cried Douglas; "and the gilded fair who would pay his debts would win all the school prices from the gushing aunts."

"I read," said Bertram, "the other day, a good story in the _Scottish American_, ent.i.tled 'Endless Gold.' A fellow, Brown hadn't a _sou_, but always declared he would win an heiress; his friends laughed at him; but one evening, on a great cotton lord, Sir Calico Twill, making a speech, he put in 'hear, hear' at the right time. The old man, pleased, invited him home to supper; there he met his heiress, fell in love (to make a long story short), proposed, and was referred to papa."

"'What is your fortune?'" enquired the pater.

"'Well, I don't exactly know,' said Brown; being uncertain whether it was a three-penny or four-penny bit under his tobacco jar. 'But, give me your daughter, and I promise she shall have endless gold.'

"'Come, don't exaggerate, Brown,'" said the tickled Twill.

"'Scarcely in my case,' said Brown; 'as be we ever so extravagant, we should never be able to set through it.'"

"'Are you telling me truth?'

"'Truth; I swear it.'

"'Then take her, my boy, and her eight thousand a year; how pleased I am she has been saved from fortune-hunters.'

"They were married; Brown made the money fly; bills came in. Scene: Sir Calico in a rage.

"'Where is the endless gold you promised?'

"'Here,' said Brown, coolly, taking his wife's hand and showing her wedding-ring; 'and what just fits one of my Wife's taper fingers I am quite sure we could never get through.'"

"'There is one thing in our favour, papa,' said his daughter; 'no one can say I have married a fool.'"

"Not bad," laughed Douglas.

"Henceforth," said Vaura, merrily, "I shall, in imagination, see small Everly and his kind labelled 'Endless Gold.'"

"That little Tompkins will be in the market again this coming season,"

said Bertram; "I wonder who the successful angler will be."

"Unhappy heiresses," said Douglas, mockingly; "Cupid's darts are not for thee."

"Thank heaven," said Vaura; "the man who takes my hand for the walk through life will not take it for the gold he will find in its palm."

"The knowledge that the soft hand in his was his own," said Bertram, "would so fill him with ecstacy, with one look at the face, that the precious metal would be only in his thoughts as a setting for the pearl he had won."

"Bravo, Bertram," said Douglas.

"_Merci_, Monsieur," said Vaura, smiling; "you flatter my poor charms; but we cannot deceive ourselves; this is, as Mark Twain says, the 'gilded age,' and in going to the altar one of the two must have the yellow sovereign."

"Yes, Vaura, you are right; one or other, it matters not, must have a full hand," said her G.o.dmother.

CHAPTER XII.

SOARING!--THENCE TO THINGS OF EARTH.

"By the way, Roland, _cher garcon_ have your people yet returned to Surrey?" enquired Vaura.

"The first detachment, consisting of the governor, with mother, now delight the flock with their presence; and the paters, pipe, flock and sermons again occupy his attention. The damsel Isabel is still at Paris, whither yours truly is journeying to carry the child home to our parents."

"I suppose Robert is still at Oxford?" said Lady Esmondet.

"No, at Rome; by the way, you and Vaura will see him; he is inc.u.mbent of St. Augustine's."

"How strange it will be to see my old playmate (sad, wound up in himself kind of boy he was) doing clergyman's duty," said Vaura.

"You should have heard," said Douglas, eagerly, "the pitched battles he and I fought at vacation over the vexed question of High and Low Church. I just went for him; and anyone overhearing would have thought me an itinerant pedlar of theology--in the vulgar tongue, street preacher--scorning all form as Papal; one would have thought me encased in Gladstonian armour of Disestablishment, to have heard my harangue. Poor Bob; in vain he expatiated on the glories of the ancient fathers; in vain he took all the saints out for an airing; in vain he talked of the ritual coming to us from the Jews of old; in vain he a.s.serted that Ritualism had brought life and vigour into a slumbering church; in vain he talked of the old fox-hunting clergy; in vain he talked of what a glorious thing for our church to give in a little, and Rome to give in less; of how union would be strength, and of the brave front we would show to all Christendom; of all we could do in stamping out infidelity and rationalism; in fact, he was sanguine of taking in everybody; all dissenters were to join us _en ma.s.se_. Upon my word, Bob was eloquent; I a.s.sure you, he was so enthusiastic, that in my mind's eye I saw the whole human family-- black, white, and copper-coloured, London belles and factory girls, swells and sweeps--all with one voice singing the most p.r.o.nounced of High Church hymns, a cross in every hand, and all clothed, not by Worth or a London tailor, but in the garb of monk and nun. His earnestness so carried me away that I did not awake to myself and things of earth until I felt the pins sticking into my flesh under my monkish robe. I then thought it time to don the armour of the Low Churchman, and come to the rescue of the human family, engaged, clothed and ornamented as above. So, to slaughter the vision, I fell to by telling him he belonged to the Anglo-Catholics; was as one with the Greek Catholics, and any liberal Catholics in the Latin Church who did not accept extreme Roman Catholic views."

"And what answer did you receive from Father Douglas?" enquired Bertram; "did he acknowledge the truth of your charge?"

"Yes, by Jove, he did; he acknowledged that the union of the Anglican with the Roman communion was the dearest wish of his heart; that he would strain every nerve in the struggle to bring about its fulfilment; that though, no doubt, infidelity was making rapid strides, still churchmen generally united in thinking that before long, and for the common good, petty differences would be sunk in the grand magnitude of the act of the union of the churches, when infidelity would be drowned in the waves of truth."

"And a grand, majestic scheme," said Vaura; "but we are too easy-going in our religious paces to carry it out; to be sure, we all go to church to-day; but why? Because, forsooth, it is respectable and fashionable. But, I believe that where the ceremonial is conducted in the most imposing manner--and the worship of the King of Kings could not be conducted with too much splendour--that there, we gay b.u.t.terflies of to-day, are compelled to think of whose presence we are in, are awed into the thought of whose honour all this is done in.

Yes, one there has other thoughts than one's neighbour's _tout ensemble_."

"There is something in what you and Robert say, Vaura," said her G.o.dmother; "but, to tell the truth, I bother myself very little as to our church differences. Disestablishment, by Hon. Gladstone, is a real unrest to me."

"Oh, I don't know; let it stand or fall by its own merit," said Douglas.