Sir Brook Fossbrooke Volume I Part 15

"Balfour eyed me, and I eyed him, with, I take it, pretty much the same result, which said plainly enough, 'You 're not the man for me.'

"'What in heaven's name is this?' cried the Viceroy, as he got outside and saw Lady Drumcarran at the head of a procession carrying plants, slips, and flower-pots down to the carriage.

"'Her Ladyship has made a raid amongst the greeneries,' said Balfour, 'and tipped the head-gardener, that tall fellow there with the yellow rose-tree; as the place is going to be sold, she thought she might well do a little genteel pillage.' Curious to see who our gardener could be, all the more that he was said to be 'tall,' I went forward, and what do you think I saw? Sir Brook, with a flower-pot under one arm, and a quant.i.ty of cuttings under the other, walking a little after the Countess, who was evidently giving him ample directions as to her intentions. I could scarcely refrain from an outburst of laughing, but I got away into the shrubbery and watched the whole proceedings. I was too far off to hear, but this much I saw. Sir Brook had deposited his rose-tree and his slips on the rumble, and stood beside the carriage with his hat off. When his Excellency came up, a sudden movement took place in the group, and the Viceroy, seeming to push his way through the others, cried out something I could not catch, and then grasped Sir Brook's hand with both his own. All was tumult in a moment. My Lady, in evident confusion and shame,--that much I could see,--was courtesying deeply to Sir Brook, who seemed not to understand her apologies--, at least, he appeared stately and courteous, as usual, and not in the slightest degree put out or chagrined by the incident. Though Lady Drumcarran was profuse of her excuses, and most eager to make amends for her mistake, the Viceroy took Sir Brook's arm and led him off to a little distance, where they talked together for a few moments.

"'It's a promise, then, Fossbrooke,--you promise me!' cried he aloud, as he approached the carriage.

"'Rely upon me,--and within a week, or ten days at farthest,' said Sir Brook, as they drove away.

"I have not seen him since, and I scarcely know if I shall be able to meet him without laughing."

"Here he comes," cried Lucy; "and take care, Tom, that you do nothing that might offend him."

The caution was so far unnecessary that Sir Brook's manner, as he drew near, had a certain stately dignity that invited no raillery.

"You have been detained a long time a prisoner, Dr. Len-drick," said Fossbrooke, calmly; "but your visitors were so charmed with all they saw that they lingered on, unwilling to take their leave."

"Tom tells me we had some of our county notabilities,--Lord and Lady Drumcarran, the Lacys, and others," said Lendrick.

"Yes; and the Lord-Lieutenant, too, whom I used to know at Christ Church. He would have been well pleased to have met you. He told me your father was the ablest and most brilliant talker he ever knew."

"Ah! we are very unlike," said Lendrick, blushing modestly. "Did he give any hint as to whether his party are pleased or the reverse with my father's late conduct?"

"He only said, 'I wish you knew him, Fossbrooke; I sincerely wish you knew him, if only to a.s.sure him that he will meet far more generous treatment from us than from the Opposition.' He added that we were men to suit each other; and this, of course, was a flattery for which I am very grateful."

"And the tall man with the stoop was the Lord-Lieutenant?" asked Tom. "I pa.s.sed half an hour or more with him in the library, and he invited me to call upon him, and told a young fellow, named Balfour, to give me his address, which he forgot to do."

"We can go together, if you have no objection; for I, too, have promised to pay my respects," said Sir Brook.

Tom was delighted at the suggestion, but whispered in his sister's ear, as they pa.s.sed out into the garden, "I thought I 'd have burst my sides laughing when I met him; but it's the very last thing in my thoughts now. I declare I 'd as soon pull a tiger's whiskers as venture on the smallest liberty with him."

"I think you are right, Tom," said she, squeezing his arm affectionately, to show that she not alone agreed with him, but was pleased that he had given her the opportunity of doing so.

"I wonder is he telling the governor what happened this morning? It can scarcely be that, though, they look so grave."

"Papa seems agitated too," said Lucy.

"I just caught Trafford's name as they pa.s.sed. I hope he 's not saying anything against him. It is not only that Lionel Trafford is as good a fellow as ever lived, but that he fully believes Fossbrooke likes him. I don't think he could be so false; do you, Lucy?"

"I 'm certain he is not. There, papa is beckoning to you; he wants you;"

and Lucy turned hurriedly away, anxious to conceal her emotion, for her cheeks were burning, and her lips trembled with agitation.

CHAPTER XIV. TOM CROSS-EXAMINES HIS SISTER

It was decided on that evening that Sir Brook and Tom should set out for Dublin the next morning. Lucy knew not why this sudden determination had been come to, and Tom, who never yet had kept a secret from her, was now reserved and uncommunicative. Nor was it merely that he held aloof his confidence, but he was short and snappish in his manner, as though she had someway vexed him, and vexed him in some shape that he could not openly speak of or resent.

This was very new to her from him, and yet how was it? She had not courage to ask for an explanation. Tom was not exactly one of those people of whom it was pleasant to ask explanations., Where the matter to be explained might be one of delicacy, he had a way of abruptly blurting out the very thing one would have desired might be kept back. Just as an awkward surgeon will tear off the dressing, and set a wound a-bleeding, would he rudely destroy the work of time in healing by a moment of rash impatience. It was knowing this--knowing it well--that deterred Lucy from asking what might lead to something not over-agreeable to hear.

"Shall I pack your portmanteau, Tom?" asked she. It was a task that always fell to her lot.

"No; Nicholas can do it,--any one can do it," said he, as he mumbled with an unlit cigar between his teeth.

"You used to say I always did it best, Tom,--that I never forgot anything," said she, caressingly.

"Perhaps I did,--perhaps I thought so. Look here, Lucy," said he, as though by an immense effort he had got strength to say what he wanted, "I am half vexed with you, if not more than half."

"Vexed with me, Tom,--vexed with _me!_ and for what?"

"I don't think that you need ask. I am inclined to believe that you know perfectly well what I mean, and what I would much rather not say, if you will only let me."

"I do not," said she, slowly and deliberately.

"Do you mean to say, Lucy," said he, and his manner was almost stern as he spoke, "that you have no secrets from me, that you are as frank and outspoken with me today as you were three months ago?"

"I do say so."

"Then what's the meaning of this letter?" cried he, as, carried away by a burst of pa.s.sion, he overstepped all the prudential reserve he had sworn to himself to regard. "What does this mean?"

"I know nothing of that letter, nor what it contains," said she, blushing till her very brow became crimson.

"I don't suppose you do, for though it is addressed to you, the seal is unbroken; but you know whose handwriting it's in, and you know that you have had others from the same quarter."

"I believe the writing is Mr. Trafford's," said she, as a deathlike paleness spread over her face, "because he himself once asked me to read a letter from him in the same handwriting."

"Which you did?"

"No; I refused. I handed the letter back to him unopened, and said that, as I certainly should not write to him without my father's knowledge and permission, I would not read a letter from him without the same."

"And what was the epistle, then, that the vicar's housekeeper handed him from you?"

"That same letter I have spoken of. He left it on my table, insisting and believing that on second thoughts I would read it. He thought so because it was not to me, though addressed to me, but the copy of a letter he had written to his mother, about me certainly." Here she blushed deeply again. "As I continued, however, of the same mind, determined not to see what the letter contained, I re-enclosed it and gave it to Mrs. Brennan to hand to him."

"And all this you kept a secret from me?"

"It was not my secret. It was his. It was his till such time as he could speak of it to my father, and this he told me had not yet come."

"Why not?"

"I never asked him that. I do not think, Tom," said she, with much emotion, "it was such a question as you would have had me ask."

"Do you love--Come, darling Lucy, don't be angry with me. I never meant to wound your feelings. Don't sob that way, my dear, dear Lucy. You know what a rough coa.r.s.e fellow I am; but I'd rather die than offend you.

Why did you not tell me of all this? I never liked any one so well as Trafford, and why leave me to the chance of misconstruing him? Would n't it have been the best way to have trusted me as you always have?"

"I don't see what there was to have confided to you. Mr. Trafford might, if he wished. I mean, that if there was a secret at all. I don't know what I mean," cried she, covering her face with her handkerchief, while a convulsive motion of her shoulders showed how she was moved.

"I am as glad as if I had got a thousand pounds, to know you have been so right, so thoroughly right, in all this, Lucy; and I am glad, too, that Trafford has done nothing to make me think less well of him. Let's be friends; give me your hand, like a dear, good girl, and forgive me if I have said what pained you."