Magnum Bonum; Or, Mother Carey's Brood Part 68

"Is not this close combination of the two families rather odd?"

"I don't think it is. Poor Lord Fordham is very fond of Armine, and he hates the being driven abroad every winter so much, that the meeting Armine is the only pleasant ingredient. And it has been convenient for Sydney to join our school-room party. I was very glad also, that these last two summers, there have been visits at Fordham. Staying there has given Mrs. Brownlow and the younger ones some insight into what the life at Belforest might be, but never has been; and they will not be kept out of it any longer."

"Then they are going home!"

"After the London season."

"Why, little Barbara is surely not coming out yet?"

"No; but Elvira is."

"Ah! by the bye, was I not told that I was to have two weddings?"

"Allen wished it, but the Elf won't hear of it. She says she had no notion of turning into a stupid old married woman before she has had any fun."

"Does she care for him?"

"I don't think she is capable of caring for any one much. I don't know whether she may ever soften with age; but--"

"Say it, Mary--out with it."

"I never saw such a heartless little b.u.t.terfly! She did not care a rush when her good old grandfather died, and I don't believe she has one fraction more love for Mrs. Brownlow, or Allen, or anybody else. The best thing I can see is that she is too young to perceive the prudence of securing Allen; but perhaps that is only frivolity, and he, poor fellow, is so devoted to her, that it is quite provoking to see how she trifles with and torments him."

"Isn't it rather good for the great Mr. Brownlow? Not much besides has contradicted him, I should imagine."

"His mother thinks that it is the perpetual restlessness in which Elvira keeps him that renders him so unsettled, and that if they were once married he would have some peace of mind, and be able to begin life in earnest. But to hurry on the marriage is such a fearful risk, with such a creature as that sprite, that she has persuaded him to wait, and let the child be satisfied by this season in London, that she may not think they are cheating her of her young lady life."

"It is on the cards, I suppose, that she might see some one whom she preferred to him?"

"Which might, in some aspects of the matter, be the best thing possible; but Mrs. Brownlow would have many conscientious scruples about the property, and Allen would be in utter despair."

"Though, of course, all this would be far better than exposing that tropical-natured Spanish b.u.t.terfly to meeting the subject of a grand pa.s.sion too late," said Mr. Ogilvie.

"Yes; of course that must be in his mother's mind, though I don't suppose she expresses it even to herself. Miss Evelyn is coming out too, and is to be presented, which reconciles the younger ones to putting off all their schemes for working at Belforest, after the true Fordham and story-book fashion. Besides, Mrs. Brownlow always feels that she has a duty towards Elvira, even apart from Allen."

"And what do you think of Allen? He seems very pleasant and gentlemanly."

"That's just what he is! He has always been as agreeable and nice as possible all these eight years that I have been with them, and has treated me entirely as his mother's old friend. I can't help liking Allen very much, and wondering what he would have been if--if he had had to work for his living--or if Elvira had not been such a little tormenting goose--or if, all manner of ifs--indeed; but they all resolve themselves into one question if there be much stuff in him!"

"If not, he is the only one of the family without, except, perhaps, Jock."

"Oh! if you saw Jock now, you would not doubt that there's plenty of substance in him! He has been a very different person ever since his illness in Switzerland, as full of life and fun as ever, but thoroughly in earnest about doing right. He had an immense number of marks for the army examination, and seems by all accounts to be keeping up to regular work, now that it is more voluntary."

"Is he not rather wasted on the Guards!"

"Well, that was Sir James Evelyn's doing. They are glad enough to have him there to look after his friend, Mr. Evelyn, and it was one of the cases where the decision for life has to be made before the youth is old enough to understand his full capabilities. I expect Lucas, to give him his right name, will do something distinguished yet, perhaps be a great General; and I hope Sir James has interest enough to get him employment before he has eaten his heart out on drill and parade. Now that Armine's health is coming round, I do leave Caroline very happy about the younger half of her family."

"And the elder half?"

"Well! I sometimes think that there must have been something defective in the management of that excellent doctor and his mother, as if they had never taught the children proper loyal respect for her! The three younger ones have it all right, and the two elder sons are as fond of her as possible; but she never had any authority over those three from the first. Only Allen is too gentle and has too much good taste to show it; while as to the other two, Bobus's contempt is of a kindly, filial, petting description; Janet's, a nasty, defiant, overt disregard."

"Impossible! They could not dare to despise her."

"They do, for the very things that are best in her; and so far I think the Evelyn intercourse has been unlucky, since they ascribe her greater religiousness to what it suits their democratic notions to scorn. Not that there is much to complain of in Bobus's manner when we do see him.

He only uses little stings of satire, chiefly about Lord Fordham. I don't think he would knowingly pain his mother if he could help it; and for that reason there is a reserve between them."

"He is eating his terms in the Temple, is he not? And Janet? Is she studying medicine still? Does she mean to practise?"

"I can't make out. She has only been with us twice in these four years, once at Sorrento and once in London; but she has a very active dislike to Mrs. Evelyn, and vexes her mother by making no secret of it. I believe she is to take her degree at Zurich this spring, but I don't think she means to practise. She is too well off for the drudgery, but she is bent on making researches of some kind, and I think I heard of some plan of her going to attend lectures, to which her degree may admit her, but I am not sure where. The two Miss Rays seem to be happy to escort her anywhere, and that is a sort of comfort to Mrs. Brownlow.

Miss Ray keeps us informed of their comings and goings, for Janet seldom deigns to write."

"It is very strange that there should be such alienation, and from such a mother."

"The two characters are as unlike as can be, but I have always thought there must be some cause that no one but Janet herself could perhaps explain. I cannot help thinking that she has some definite purpose in this study of medicine; for I do not think it is for the sake either of the emanc.i.p.ation of women or of general philanthropy. They must be an odd party. Miss Ray attends to the household matters, mends the clothes, and pays the bills. Nita sketches, reads at the libraries, and talks at the table d'hote, like a strong-minded woman, as she is; and Janet goes her own way. Bobus looked in on them once and described them to us with great gusto."

There Mary's face became illuminated as a step approached, and a gentleman with grizzled hair, and a thoughtful, gentle face came out, and sat down on her other side.

He had been college tutor to her brother, though not much older, and had stayed on at Oxford, till two years back he had taken a much neglected living. His health had broken down under the severe work of organising, and he had accepted the easy task of reading with Armine Brownlow for the winter in a perfect climate, as a welcome mode of recruiting his strength. He had truly recruited it in an unexpected manner, and was about to take home with him one who would prove such a helpmeet as would lighten all the troubles and difficulties that had weighed so heavily on him, and remove some of them entirely.

So he came out and testified to the remarkable ability and zeal he had found in his pupil, and likewise to the spirit of industry which had prevented the desultory life of travelling and ill-health from having made him nearly so much behindhand as might have been expected. If he only had health to work steadily for the next two years, he would be quite as well prepared to matriculate at the university as all but the very foremost scholars from the public schools. Mr. Morgan thought his intellect equal to that of his brother Robert, who had taken a double first-cla.s.s, but of a finer order, being open to those poetical instincts which went for nothing with the materialistic Bobus.

Wherewith the friends fell into conversation more immediately interesting to themselves, while at the other end of the court, sheltered by a great orange-tree, a committee of the "Traveller's Joy"

was held.

For that serial still survived, though it could never be called a periodical, since it was an intermittent, and sometimes came out very rapidly, sometimes with intervals of many months; but it was always sent to, and greatly relished by, the absent members of the original party, at first at Eton, and later, two in their barracks, and one at his college at Oxford, whither, to his great satisfaction, he had gone by means of a well-won scholarship, not at his aunt's expense.

Jotapata's lengthy romance had died a natural death in the winter that had been spent between Egypt and Palestine. So far from picking up ideas from it there, Babie, in the actual sight of Mount Hermon's white crown, had begged not to be put in mind of such nonsense, and had never recurred to it; but the wells of fancy had never been dried, and the young people were happily putting together their bits of journal, their bits of history, the description of the great amphitheatre, a poem of Babie's on St. Louis's death, a spirited translation in Scott-like metre of Armine's of the opening of the AEneid, also one from the French, by Sydney, on Arab customs, and all Lord Fordham had been able to collect about Hippo, also "The Single Eye," by Allen, and "Marco's Felucca," by Armine and Babie in partnership, and a fair proportion of drollery.

"There was a s.p.a.ce left for the wedding, the greatest event the 'Traveller's Joy' had ever had on record," said Sydney, as she touched up the etching at the top of her paper, sitting on a low stool by a low mother-of-pearl inlaid Eastern table.

"The greatest and the last," chimed in Babie, as she worked away at the lace she was finishing for the bride.

"I don't see why it should be the last of the poor old 'Joy,'" said Lord Fordham, sorting the MSS. which were scattered round him on the ground.

"Well, somehow I feel as if we had come to the end of a division of our lives," returned Babie.

"Having done with swaddling bands, eh, Infanta?" said Lord Fordham, while Armine hastily sketched in pen and ink, Babie, with her hair flying and swaddling bands off, executing a war-dance. She did not like it.

"For shame, Armine! Don't you know how dreadful it is to lose dear Miss Ogilvie?"

"Of course, Babie," said her brother, "I didn't think you were such a Babie as not to know that things go by contraries."

"It is too tender a spot for irony, Armie," said Lord Fordham.

"Well," said Armine, "I shall be obliged to do something outrageous presently, so look out!"

"Not really!" said Sydney.