Lord Montagu's Page Part 47

Edward had nothing more to say; but he could not help beginning to think that his adventure with the two blacksmiths seemed likely to come over again. Somewhat quickening their pace, they rode on, and Edward made an effort to cast off the melancholy mood which had fallen upon him, and even the impression which the unsought society of a man who had spoken of him in such insulting terms had produced at first, and the conversation between him and Soubise became lively and cheerful. Mile after mile pa.s.sed; and at length, after proceeding for more than an hour and a half, on a little bank by the side of the river appeared an old church with its gray ivy-clad tower and groups of yews in the churchyard. Beyond, at the distance of some two or three hundred yards, was one of those fine antique houses, built of stone, which were erected in the end of Elizabeth's reign and in the earlier part of that of the most pompous and conceited of kings. Thick walls, small square windows, little useless towers, and somewhat peaked roofs, spoke a good deal of King James. But the lawn, as soft as velvet, the groups of shrubs, and the garden, well trimmed and swept even in the winter-time, told a tale of more modern taste.

"I fear I shall have to quit you here, sir," said Edward, as they approached the gate with its two ma.s.sy stone pillars and large b.a.l.l.s at the top. "This is the end of my journey."

"What is the name of this place?" asked Soubise.

"Applethorpe," answered Edward,--"the residence of Dr. Winthorne."

"Ha?" said Soubise; "then we shall not part so soon. This is the end of my journey also."

Edward could not refrain from turning round and gazing in his face with a look of most profound surprise; but the prince made no further remark, and, after pulling in their horses while one of the servants dismounted and opened the gates they rode up to the large arched door of the house. A heavy bell hanging outside soon brought forth an old domestic, dressed in dark gray, who gazed earnestly first at Soubise and then at Edward, both of whom had sprung to the ground while he was opening the door. At first he evidently recognised neither; but a moment after the light of honest satisfaction brightened his countenance, and, holding forth his hand to Edward, he exclaimed, "Oh, Master Ned, how glad I am to see you, and how glad the doctor will be! He has been looking for you for months. But he is not at home now, and may not come back for an hour. But come in; come in. Every thing is ready for you. Your old room is just as you left it,--not a book moved, nor a gun, nor a fishing-rod: only when I went in to-day to dust the things, I saw the ink had dried up in the horn, and was going to put in fresh this very day."

Edward shook the old man warmly by the hand; and, turning to the Prince de Soubise, he said, "If I understood you right, sir, you came to visit Dr. Winthorne. He is out, the servant says; but I have interest enough in this house to invite you to enter till his return. He will be back in an hour, and happy, I am sure, to entertain you. But, knowing my old preceptor's habits well, allow me to hint that it will be necessary to send your attendants into the village, as I shall send my servant; for, being a clergyman, he objects to have in his house what he calls 'swash-buckler serving-men;' and his rule apply to all, however high the quality of his guests."

Soubise smiled; and, ushering him into the library, Edward proceeded, amidst the somewhat garrulous joy of the old footman, to direct Pierrot to take the other men down to the village inn, to tell the host there to attend on them well, "for Master Ned's sake," and then to return as soon as might be with his saddle-bags.

The prince merely ordered his baggage to be brought up, directing his men to take care of themselves, and seeming fully satisfied that he would be a welcome guest. He took some books from the shelves of the library, examined them cursorily, and put them back, saying, "The good doctor seems to have improved much in worldly matters. He has attained, apparently, the state he always desired,--competency, and enough to have a good library. Can any one imagine a man more happy?"

"Perhaps not," said Edward, gravely. "I believe circ.u.mscribed desires and moderate fortunes attain the height of human felicity."

"Not so," said Soubise. "I believe every human life must be looked at as an aggregate; and skilful would be the calculator who could reduce to an exact sum how much joy and how much sorrow are required to equivale a given portion of calm and unimpa.s.sioned existence. All these things are as the individual views them. We have nothing in this life by which to measure the real value of any object but our own tastes. You may like a pearl better than a diamond; I may esteem the flashing l.u.s.tre of the one more than the calm serenity of the other. That man is only happy who obtains what he really desires. But here come our men, I see, with the baggage."

CHAPTER XLVI.

The Prince de Soubise stood at the window of the library of Applethorpe alone; for Edward had made an excuse to leave him, not thinking himself bound to play the host in a house which was not his, nor to act as the entertainer of a man whom he had some good cause, as he thought, to dislike. Soubise was then past forty, however, and he did not--as indeed who does in middle life?--look upon trifles with the serious view which one takes of them in earlier years. "Hasty and quick in quarrel" applies to small as well as great things; and Heaven knows how much patience we acquire each day by the mere habit of endurance. He received the young man's apology in good part, then; and, while Edward Langdale went to speak to every old servant and then to change his travel-stained dress, he stood, as I have said, at the window and gazed forth upon a scene to be viewed in no other country under the sky,--a home scene of English life. It is probably of no age, of no time; for it is an impress of the mind and character of the people. But I must not dwell upon it. The chapter of descriptions has gone by. Soubise gazed out, compared that which was before his eyes with that on which they might have rested in his own country, admired what he saw, and perhaps, in the desponding mood which certainly then affected him, felt sorry that France had not so calm, so peaceful, and so happy a look as an English country-village.

After he had continued gazing for some ten minutes, upon the road before him appeared an elderly man upon a fine stout horse, with clerical hat and ca.s.sock turned up, and a servant following him on a still better beast. They both rode fast; and, though the first sat his steed somewhat after the fashion of a sack of wheat, it was clear that the saddle was quite familiar to him, and the slouching shoulders and negligent air were more the consequences of perfect ease and habit than of awkwardness. The servant pulled back the gate: his master dashed through, and in a moment after Dr. Winthorne was at the door.

The old footman ran forth to give him entrance, and a few words pa.s.sed, of which Soubise only heard the words, "Ned come back? Tell the dear fellow to come down. A stranger? Well, we must see strangers." And the door of the library opened.

Dr. Winthorne gazed at Soubise, and the prince at him, without any sign of recognition as they approached each other. But suddenly the reverend gentleman stopped, exclaiming, "G.o.d bless me! Monsieur Soubise! On my life, sir, I am glad to see you. When did you come over? How fares it with you? You are older by a good deal, but you look well. I am right?--surely the Prince de Soubise?"

"The same, my good old friend," said the prince. "I am not surprised you doubt, for I feel I am much changed. It is ten long years since we met, and with me they have been stormy years."

"So I have heard," said the good doctor, "though news travels but slowly in our poor country. But I have watched your n.o.ble struggles as closely as I could; and I have felt great interest in them all, though you--every one of you--made great mistakes. And now Roch.e.l.le is lost.

G.o.d help us! It is a sad case; but she could hold out no longer; and that Mayor Guiton is a n.o.ble man."

"He is indeed," said Soubise; "and his character has risen in my opinion by what has been told me by a young gentleman who came hither with me----"

"Odds-my-life!" cried the old doctor, "my boy Ned!--Ned Langdale! I must go, prince,--I must go and hug him. Sir, he is as fine a youth as ever lived, and ought to be a great man. G.o.d send he may escape it! But I have not seen him yet. Excuse me: I will be back in a minute. Make yourself at home; make yourself at home. All shall be prepared for you before you can say Amen."

With this somewhat unconnected speech, Dr. Winthorne left the room, and in a few minutes returned with Edward Langdale, who allowed himself to be introduced to the prince with cold ceremony. "He says," observed Dr.

Winthorne, "that somehow you have not treated him well. But we will talk of that after supper. Every thing should be explained between all people; but no explanation should take place fasting. The humors are then in a bad condition; and, as there is no chance in my house of people heating them by potations, we will just calmly regulate them by wholesome food and moderate drink, and then have a clear understanding."

"I am perfectly unconscious----" said the prince; but the doctor cut him short, exclaiming, "After supper, after supper, my lord! Your apartments are quite ready. Let me conduct you."

The old clergyman and the Protestant prince retired from the room, and Dr. Winthorne was nearly half an hour absent. When he returned, however, he shook Edward once more warmly by the hand, saying, "Why, Ned, my boy, you are grown quite a man. Heaven show us mercy! you have a beard an ell long. But now tell me all that has happened to you. As to this man up-stairs, he is a good man, a very good man,--hasty, but n.o.ble and generous, steady in his friend-ships, true to his cause. There is some mistake between you and him. He says your brother Richard wrote to him, or visited him, or something, and he might have treated him with some indignity; but he never saw or heard of you in his life till last night, when he met you at an inn."

Edward smiled, saying, "He must have a short memory."

"Well, well," said Dr. Winthorne, "we will have it all after supper. Now tell me every thing you have done and seen and suffered; for I doubt not you have suffered too, my poor boy. We shall have plenty of time if this prince takes as long to bedizen himself as he used to do. He was a mighty fop in other years; but he has a more soldier-like look now.

Well, Ned, give me the whole story."

Edward Langdale willingly enough related succinctly what had befallen him since he parted from the good doctor nearly two years before. There was a good deal, indeed, he did not tell, for he knew that the explanations required would be too long for the limited s.p.a.ce before him. Indeed, before even the abbreviated narrative was brought to a close, the Prince de Soubise joined them, and they retired into another chamber to supper.

The meal pa.s.sed over in great cheerfulness; the wine was good, and of that quality which parsons loved in those days, but all partook moderately; and as soon as the servants had withdrawn--for supper at that period of the world's history was served with very nearly the same forms as dinner in the present times--Soubise bowed his head to Edward Langdale, saying, in not very good English, "There must be some mistake between us, sir. I should like to have it set right, for your father was one of my dearest friends. We travelled long together with this worthy minister; and I wish much to remove any thing like coldness between myself and his son."

"I really do not know, Monsieur de Soubise," replied Edward, in French, "what mistake there can be. But may I ask if in June of last year you did not write a letter to your brother the Duc de Rohan, in which you styled me an insolent varlet? The duke sent me the letter, and my eyes, I think, cannot have deceived me."

"No, no!" cried Soubise. "Stay; let me remember. I applied that term,"

he continued, more slowly, "to Sir Richard Langdale, your father's eldest son, who, as I have been told and as I have still reason to believe, had robbed you of your property,--of your mother's as well as your father's inheritance. To the latter he might have some claim: even that is doubtful. To the former he had none."

"Unfortunately, by the laws of this country he had," said Edward. "But all this is past and over, and----"

"Stay, stay," said Soubise, interrupting him. "It is not all over yet: it is the very cause of my coming here. I was a witness, sir, to the marriage-contract--or settlement, as you call it here, I believe--between your father and your mother, by which it was agreed that all the property she possessed, not only at the time, but which might descend to her from her uncle, should belong to her and descend to her children. In his last letter, when he thought himself dying, good old Clement Tournon informed me that this very property had been taken from you by him whom I may well call your base-born brother. Having done all that I had to do, and been disappointed in all,--having seen the n.o.ble Buckingham die at my feet, and borne the loss of Roch.e.l.le,--my first business was to come on here to see right done if it could be done."

"There, Edward! there!" said Dr. Winthorne. "I told you he was n.o.ble and true."

"I doubted it not, my dear friend," replied Edward. "But still the words his Highness used were somewhat galling."

"They never were applied to you, upon my honor," said the prince. "As far as I recollect now,--for it was a time of great hurry and confusion,--I had heard that Richard Langdale, whose whole history I knew as well as my daily service, was at the court of France soliciting some place from his Majesty. My brother wrote to me, mentioning only Monsieur de Langdale. Probably it was to you he referred. Probably he was deceived as well as myself, although he did not know so much of the circ.u.mstances as I did. My cousin left his child with his dying breath to my charge, enjoining me strictly to have her educated in the Protestant faith, and never to suffer her to fall into the hands----"

"What!" exclaimed Dr. Winthorne, interrupting him,--"dear little Lucette? How is the sweet child? where is she? Oh that I could see her again for an hour! for she was an angel. Do you remember, Edward, that you once had a little sister, and that when you were ill of fever she disappeared?"

"Was that Lucette?" exclaimed Edward. "Remember her, my dear sir? Oh, yes! But how can that be? her death killed my mother, I think. Lucette my sister!" And he gazed down upon the table with a bewildered mind and a chilly, painful feeling at the heart, such as he never had experienced in life before. "I cannot comprehend," he added. "Lucette my sister! My sister not dead!"

"No, no," said Dr. Winthorne. "Tell him all, my lord the prince. Lucette is not your sister: she merely pa.s.sed as such. Your father and your mother took her in very early years to hide her from her Roman Catholic relations in France, out of love and friendship for this n.o.ble gentleman. Those relations were powerful here as well as in the neighboring country; and at length they discovered where she was, but Monsieur de Soubise came over and removed her, first to the town of Brixham, where she remained some years, and thence to France. I had some share in all this, too. But you are mistaken, my son, about your mother's death. She grieved to lose her little pet, and wept often and bitterly at her loss; but the origin of her illness was a terrible fire which consumed your father's house when you were very young. Then, exposure and injuries received before she could escape sowed the seeds of that sad malady which, in this land of ours, like Death's gardener, culls the sweetest and most beautiful flowers to decorate the grave."

"Then she is not my sister?" exclaimed Edward. "She is not dead! Thank G.o.d for that!"

It might be difficult for those who heard it to know which he thanked G.o.d for most; and the exclamation produced a slight smile upon the countenance of Dr. Winthorne.

"Methinks, prince," he said, "this young man must have met Lucette since. You dog, you told me nothing of that."

But the Prince de Soubise was very grave. "Let us not talk of that part of the subject to-night," he said. "I fear there are painful conclusions before us. But, Mr. Langdale, my friendship for your father and my deep grat.i.tude to your saintly mother make me most anxious to see you reinstated in her fine property. Let us consult what can be done. I am here ready to swear I signed the deed as witness with my own hand."

"That will not be sufficient," said Dr. Winthorne, with somewhat of a smile on his countenance. "In this land we shall require the deed itself. But let us ride over to-morrow to Buckley and see our old friend Sykes, the hunch-backed attorney; for I cannot help thinking that he knows something more than he will tell me. For the last six months he has been keeping up the place at his own expense; for I dare say you have heard, Edward, that no one has known any thing of Sir Richard for more than twelve months. He draws no rents, sends over no orders. His lawyer here has written and sent to Turin, but no intelligence whatever can be procured; and many people think that he is dead."

"It is very strange," said the Prince de Soubise. "But I have no belief in the report of his death. Most likely he is wandering somewhere, and does not wish the place of his abode to be known. He was always very eccentric."

"Then you know him, my lord?" said Edward, who had not lately mingled in the conversation; for some words which had fallen from Soubise had saddened him.

"I have not seen him for many years," replied the prince; "but even then he was as strange a boy as I ever saw. There was insanity in the family of his mother, and some people thought that the child would grow up an idiot. It was not so, however. Though he was very strange, this strangeness never reached to madness. Fits of moody gloom would come upon him, and he often would not speak a word for hours. If he did, it would be with a bitter and supercilious tone, very extraordinary in a mere child. Then, again, at times he would fly into the most violent fits of pa.s.sion, and then sink into melancholy. The way I learned all this is easily explained. At your father's request I took some charge of him after his mother's death in the convent; but his behavior became so bad that I had to relinquish the trust."

"You applied to him, a short time since," said Edward, "a somewhat hard and unpleasant expression. You said that you might almost call him base-born. Is it too much to ask that you would give me some information on that point?"