A True Friend Part 10

"Do you sketch?" said Nora quickly.

"Oh, yes, I sketch a little," he answered in a careless sort of way--for what was the use of telling this little girl that his pictures had been hung in the Salon and the Academy, or that he had hopes of one day rising to fame and fortune in his recently adopted profession? He was not given to boasting of his own success, and besides, this child--with her saucy face and guileless eyes--would not understand either his ambitions or his achievements.

But Nora's one talent was for drawing, and although the instruction she had received was by no means of the best, she had good taste and a great desire to improve her skill. So Cuthbert's admission excited her interest at once.

"Have you been sketching now?" she asked. "Oh, do let me see what you have done?"

Cuthbert's portfolio was under his arm. He laughed, hesitated, then dropped on one knee beside her and began to exhibit his sketches. It was thus--side by side, with heads very close together--that Janetta, much to her amazement, found them on her return.

CHAPTER VIII.

FATHER AND CHILD.

Janetta had set off on her expedition to Brand Hall out of an impulse of mingled pity and indignation--pity for the little boy, indignation against the mother who could desert him, perhaps against the father too. This feeling prevented her from realizing all at once the difficult position in which she was now placing herself; the awkwardness in which she would be involved if Mr. Brand declared that he knew nothing of the child, or would have nothing to do with it. "In that case," she said to herself, with an admiring glance at the lovely little boy, "I shall have to adopt him, I think! I wonder what poor mamma would say!"

She found her way without difficulty to the front-door of the long, low, rambling red house which was dignified by the name of Brand Hall. The place had a desolate look still, in spite of its being inhabited.

Scarcely a window was open, and no white blinds or pretty curtains could be seen at the cas.e.m.e.nts. The door was also shut; and as it was one of those wide oaken doors, mantled with creepers, and flanked with seats, which look as if they should always stand hospitably open, it gave the stranger a sense of coldness and aloofness to stand before it. And, also, there was neither bell nor a knocker--a fact which showed that few visitors ever made their appearance at Brand Hall. Janetta looked about her in dismay, and then tapped at the door with her fingers, while the child followed her every movement with his great wondering eyes, and finally said, gravely--

"I think they have all gone to sleep in this house, like the people in the 'Sleeping Beauty' story."

"Then you must be the Fairy Prince to wake them all up," said Janetta, laughingly.

The boy looked at her as if he understood; then, suddenly stooping, he picked up a fallen stick and proceeded to give the door several smart raps upon its oaken panels.

This summons procured a response. The door was opened, after a good deal of ineffectual fumbling at bolts and rattling of chains, by an old, white-haired serving man, who looked as if he had stepped out of the story to which Julian had alluded. He was very deaf, and it was some time before Janetta could make him understand that she wanted to see Mrs. Brand. Evidently Mrs. Brand was not in the habit of receiving visitors. At last he conducted her to the dark little drawing-room where the mistress of the house usually sat, and here Janetta was received by the pale, grey-haired woman whom she had seen fainting on the Beaminster road. It was curious to notice the agitation of this elderly lady on Janetta's appearance. She stood up, crushed her handkerchief between her trembling fingers, took a step towards her visitor, and then stood still, looking at her with such extraordinary anxiety that Janetta was quite confused and puzzled by it. Seeing that her hostess could not in any way a.s.sist her out of her difficulty, she faced it boldly by introducing herself.

"My name is Janetta Colwyn," she began. "I believe that my mother was a relation of Mr. Brand's--a cousin----"

"Yes, a first cousin," said Mrs. Brand, nervously. "I often heard him speak of her--I never saw her----"

She paused, looked suspiciously at Janetta, and colored all over her thin face. Janetta paused also, being taken somewhat by surprise.

"No, I don't suppose you ever saw her," she said, "but then you went abroad, and my dear mother died soon after I was born. Otherwise, I daresay you would have known her."

Mrs. Brand gave her a strange look. "You think so?" she said. "But no--you are wrong: she always looked down on me. She never would have been friendly with me if she had lived."

"Indeed," said Janetta, very much astonished. "I always heard that it was the other way--that Mr. Brand was angry with _her_ for marrying a poor country surgeon, and would not speak to her again."

"That is what they may have said to you. But you were too young to be told the truth," said the sad-faced woman, beginning to tremble all over as she spoke. "No, your mother would not have been friends with me. I was not her equal--and she knew I was not."

"Oh, indeed, you make a mistake: I am sure you do," cried Janetta, becoming genuinely distressed as this view of her mother's character and conduct was fixed upon her. "My mother was always gentle and kind, they tell me; I am sure she would have been your friend--as I will be, if you will let me." She held out her hands and drew those of the trembling woman into her warm young clasp. "I am a cousin too," she said, blushing a little as she a.s.serted herself in this way, "and I hope you will let me come to see you sometimes and make you less lonely."

"I am always lonely, and I always shall be lonely to the end of time,"

said Mrs. Brand, slowly and bitterly. "However"--with an evident attempt to recover her self-possession--"I shall always be pleased to see you.

Did--did--your father send you here to-night?"

"No," said Janetta, remembering her errand. "He does not know----"

"Does not know?" The pale woman again looked distressed. "Oh," she said, turning away with a sigh and biting her lip, "then I shall not see you again."

"Indeed you will," said Janetta, warmly. "My father would never keep me away from any one who wanted me--and one of my mother's relations too.

But I came to-night because I found this dear little boy outside your grounds. He tells me that his name is Julian Wyvis Brand, and that he is your son's little boy."

For the first time Mrs. Brand turned her eyes upon the child. Hitherto she had not noticed him much, evidently thinking that he belonged to Janetta, and was also a visitor. But when she saw the boy's sweet little face and large dark eyes, she turned pale, and made a gesture as of warning or dislike.

"Take him away! take him away," she said. "Yes, I can see that it is _her_ child--and his child too. She must be here too, and she has been the ruin of my boy's life!" And then she sank into a chair and burst into an agony of tears.

Janetta felt, with an inexpressible pang, that she had set foot in the midst of some domestic tragedy, the like of which had never come within her ken before. She was conscious of a little recoil from it, such as is natural to a young girl who has not learnt by experience the meaning of sorrow; but the recoil was followed by a rush of that sympathy for which she had always shown a great capacity. Her instinct led her instantly to comfort and console. She knelt down beside the weeping woman and put one arm round her, drawing the little boy forward with her left hand as she spoke.

"Oh, don't cry--don't cry!" she murmured. "He has come to be a joy and a comfort to you, and he wants you to love him too."

"Won't you love me, grandmamma?" said the sweet childish voice. And Julian laid his hand on the poor woman's shaking knee. "Don't cry, grandmamma."

It was this scene which met the eyes of Wyvis Brand when he turned the handle of the drawing-room door and walked into the room. His mother weeping, with a child before her, and a dark-haired girl on her knees with one arm round the weeping woman and one round the lovely child. It was a pretty picture, and Wyvis Brand was not insensible to its beauty.

He stood, looking prom one to another of the group.

"What does all this mean?" he asked, in somewhat harsh tones.

His mother cried aloud and caught the child to her breast.

"Oh, Wyvis, be kind--be merciful," she gasped. "This is your child--your child. You will not drive him away. She has left him at our door."

Wyvis walked into the room, shut the door behind him, and leaned against it.

"Upon my word," he said, sarcastically, "you will give this lady--whose name I haven't the pleasure of knowing--a very fine idea of our domestic relations. I am not such a brute, I hope, as to drive away my own child from my door; but I certainly should like to know first whether it is my child; and more particularly whether it is my son and heir, as I have no doubt that this young gentleman is endeavoring to persuade you. Did _you_ bring the child here?" he said, turning sharply to Janetta.

"I brought him into the house, certainly," she said, rising from her knees and facing him. "I found him outside your fence; and he told me that his name was Julian Wyvis Brand."

"Pretty evidence," said Mr. Brand, very rudely, as Janetta thought. "Who can tell whether the child is not some beggar's brat that has nothing to do with me?"

"Don't you know your own little boy when you see him?" Janetta demanded, indignantly.

"Not I. I have not set eyes on him since he was a baby. Turn round, youngster, and let me have a look at you."

The child faced him instantly, much as Janetta herself had done. There was a fearless look in the baby face, an innocent, guileless courage in the large dark eyes, which must surely, thought Janetta, touch a father's heart. But Wyvis Brand looked as if it would take a great deal to move him.

"Where do you come from?" said Mr. Brand, sternly.

"From over the sea."

"That's no answer. Where from?--what place?"

The boy looked at him without answering.