Tales of the Wonder Club Volume I Part 33

It now began to be rumoured abroad in society that I was none other than that very Blackdeed whose acting had created such a _furore_ in the world. It also began to be said that I was the heir to an immense fortune, out of which I had been swindled by an unprincipled uncle. I met those who knew my family well, and my misfortune procured for me the sympathy of many. I possessed a still greater interest in the eyes of the world now, and I found myself a greater lion than ever.

On one occasion after I had been acting Romeo at our theatre I donned my dress clothes and dropped in late at a friend's house where there was a ball, and here I made the acquaintance of a certain family who resided not far from my father's house and knew my father intimately. The family consisted of an elderly gentleman, his wife, and three daughters.

The two elder sisters were very ordinary young ladies, such as one is sure to find in every ball-room. They were neither pretty nor ugly; their manners conventional, their conversation flat and insipid. When talking to one they appeared to be thinking of something else, and their answers were generally in monosyllables.

The youngest daughter, however, differed much from her two eldest sisters, both in mind and in features; so much so, indeed, that I imagined for some time that she must be their step-sister, but this was not the case, as I found out afterwards. Maud--that was the name of the younger--was by far the cleverest really of the whole family, and yet she was looked upon as a ninny by the rest. She had more originality in her than either of her two sisters, as I soon observed from her remarks; but she was also more retired, and preferred to hide her light, as it were, under a bushel. It was only now and then that I could catch a glimpse of it, but when I did so it was most brilliant.

Without being strikingly beautiful, her face had that in it that captivates more than mere beauty. The expression was ingenuous and pensive, at times melancholy. When in society she never seemed like one of the herd, or to take the slightest interest in what was going on. She went through her dancing mechanically, and always seemed in the clouds, or, as her sisters would say, "wool-gathering."

It was easy to see from the first that no very sister-like feeling existed between the two elder sisters and their younger one. Even the parents preferred their two elder girls to their youngest daughter.

The fact was that they--none of them--understood her; she was not of their order, and they set her down as rather wanting. If she was scolded for anything and she bore the rebuke with patience, this was set down to indifference and want of feeling, when my own experience of her character was that she was the most sensitive creature that I had ever met with. If, as was often the case, she fell into a reverie in company, it was called sulkiness, and if when asked to perform on the piano, she meekly obeyed in a sort of languid manner peculiar to herself, it was called unwillingness to oblige; yet when at the instrument her touch was so soft and full of feeling, her voice so clear and modulating, that it seemed as if her whole soul was poured forth in the piece.

Nevertheless, neither her parents nor her sisters appreciated her playing, or found in it anything more artistic or soul-stirring than in the performance of other people. She was never thanked or applauded by her family for any service or kindness of hers towards them, but often upbraided for selfishness when her dreamy nature would cause her to forget the wants of others, while in reality she was one of the most unselfish beings on this earth. How many mistakes might be rectified, if the different members of a family would take the trouble to study each other more accurately!

Maud's nature was reserved to a fault; she did not care to shine, and this was put down to incapacity. Whether it was she felt she could if she chose, and in so doing utterly eclipse her two elder sisters, and consequently incur their envy, or whether it was an excess of modesty, I know not. One thing is certain, she possessed fine talents, and those, too, of an uncommon kind. Her health was delicate, and her parents, perhaps attributed her peculiarities to the state of her health, while her two sisters, without allowing any such excuse, looked upon her as a downright fool.

She was snubbed on every occasion, and kept as much as possible in the background. It will be understood that all these observations of mine were not made in a single evening. It was not until we grew intimate and I had been repeatedly invited to the house, that I found out how matters stood in the family. I could not help feeling nettled at the deliberate way in which poor Maud was put on the shelf by her elder sisters, and I felt it my duty, as much as good manners would permit me, to take her part, and pay somewhat more attention to her than to the two elder daughters.

This preference I saw was observed, and not looked upon very favourably by the parents, who, I began to find out, had marked me for one of the elder girls. I saw plainly through their schemes, and heartlessly amused myself at their discomfiture while I paid my attentions to Maud. During the summer I was invited to stay at the country seat of this family, and it was here that our intimacy ripened. Here I observed the fine points of Maud's character, in spite of all her reserve.

Without being regularly in love with each other, a sympathy had grown up between us which by others, I have no doubt, was regarded as love. We appreciated each other's talents, and esteemed each other's characters.

The family had repeatedly seen me act, and Maud, more than any of them, seemed to appreciate my acting, while I was equally charmed at her skill on the piano and on the harp, and with her singing.

"I do not know how it is, Mr. Blackdeed," she said to me one day when we were left alone together in the garden, "but you are the only person I know who treats me with respect, or, indeed, like a rational being."

"Indeed," said I, feigning not to have observed the way in which she was treated by her family. "How so?"

"Oh! you know very well how I am treated at home. I have seen the surprise on your face whenever my sisters snubbed me, and saw that you felt how unfair it was. You will not pretend that you never observed it."

"Well, Miss Maud," I replied, "your penetration is such that I cannot do other than confess that _I have_ observed it, and that I was very much surprised at it. I have often wondered what the reason could be."

She answered with a slight sigh.

"No one seems to understand me. From childhood I was ever different from the rest. I seem to live two distinct beings--one with my family, and before the world, and another in my own thoughts.

"You will have observed my silence when in company. I am aware to what it is generally attributed; but the fact is, that I have so little in common with my sisters I feel that if I were to give utterance to my ideas I should not be understood, but be considered more mad than they think me at present; hence my silence. I never knew anyone but you who thought even in the slightest degree like myself, and therefore to you I feel less inclined to be reserved than to others; in fact, with you I feel it impossible to be reserved at all.

"It is as if you had some power over me to draw out my ideas--to draw me out of myself. All my life I have longed to know someone; to have some friend who was unlike the rest of the world, and more like myself, who could understand me, and to whom I could pour out my thoughts, and feel that they were not poured out upon a desert soil."

"Do you know, Miss Maud," said I, "that from the very first I saw that you were quite different to any other young lady that I had ever met with? But far from regarding you in the light that I know your family regard you, I conceived an immense respect for you as a being of a higher order than the generality of young ladies. There was much, too, that puzzled me in your character. I was convinced that you could not but be aware that your abilities were above the ordinary, and it surprised me much that you should care so little about showing them, or even a.s.serting your right against the--the tyranny, if I may say so--of your sisters."

"Well, it is my nature," she said. "What is it to me if they _do_ have their own way in everything. I do not think it a matter worth disputing about. I do not live in their world, nor they in mine."

"And do you not long to make yourself better understood to your sisters?" I asked, after a pause.

"I should like to," she replied; "but that is impossible."

"Why impossible?" I asked. "Have you ever tried to do so?"

"No; but from my knowledge of their characters it would be useless." She paused, and then added, "Do you know that I sometimes wish that I were better suited to this world than I am? My nature is so very peculiar that perhaps you would laugh at me were I to tell you some of my peculiarities."

"No," said I; "I do not think I should laugh at any peculiarities of your nature, whatever they might be. Your nature is one to study gravely and reflect upon, not to laugh at."

"I mean," said she, "that my temperament is subject to certain phenomena that many, perhaps _you_, might call hallucinations. I have never confided this to anyone before, fearing that I should be ridiculed or perhaps placed under the hands of some ignorant doctor."

"Indeed!" I exclaimed. "I am curious to hear of what sort these phenomena are. I take an immense interest in natural phenomena, especially that sort connected with the temperament of individuals."

"Well," she answered, "as you encourage me so far, I do not mind telling you some of those most common to me. Ofttimes when I am alone, either in my chamber or walking in the fields, a sort of dizziness comes over me, and I seem to be in the midst of a bed of flowers. When I try to pluck one they instantly vanish, and the dizziness likewise disappears. At other times I have seen before me a wreath of stars, which lasts for two or three minutes, then also vanishes. I have seen, too, distinctly in the daytime the faces of certain relations of mine, long since dead, and at night I occasionally start out of my sleep and see human forms bending over me, and sometimes they speak to me."

"It is very strange," I observed. "And have you never been able to attribute these visions to any nervous excitement, or to any natural cause whatever?"

"No; on the contrary, they generally appear when I am most calm."

I told her I had heard before of similar phenomena during, or even a long time after, a serious illness, and that I thought in most cases they might be attributed to an over-excitement of the brain, brought on by indigestion or other causes. She told me that she had never had any really serious illness in her life, though she admitted that she was const.i.tutionally delicate. We then went into a metaphysical discussion, which was interrupted by the rest of the family, who came to meet us in the garden.

"I am sorry we have disturbed your _tete-a-tete_," said one of the elder sisters, quizzingly. "It must have been quite a pleasure to have been concealed behind the summer-house and listened to your intellectual conversation."

These words to a stranger would have conveyed nothing but a sort of merry banter, nor was there more conveyed in the tone, yet I, who had studied the nature of the speaker well, thought I discovered an undercurrent of sarcasm in the word "intellectual," as if she was perfectly sure that no conversation between us could be intellectual.

"There is many a true word spoken in jest," I replied. "I a.s.sure you that our conversation _has_ been _most_ intellectual. Miss Maud's ideas are so lofty, that it is really quite an effort on my part to follow her," said I, with a smile, though I really meant what I said.

"I wish she would let us have the benefit of them," said the other sister, laughing, imagining, of course, that I had spoken satirically.

"She never favours us with any of those lofty ideas."

"No?" said I, affecting astonishment. "Then I must be a favoured individual. Miss Maud's case is, however, not without parallel. Many of our greatest minds have been most reserved and una.s.suming. It is a characteristic of genius to be retired, though, if I had the abilities of Miss Maud, I am sure I should be too vain to keep them secret."

This was uttered with a sincerity of manner on my part that checked the laugh that might have arisen from the sisters, and they were silent. The mother looked at us both, first at one and then at the other, in amazement, as if she half-believed me, and scrutinised Maud very narrowly, as if she fancied she must either be a great fool or very deep.

In the course of the afternoon the lady of the house took me aside and asked me if I were in earnest in my eulogium of Maud's intellect.

I replied that I was decidedly.

"What a strange girl it is!" she exclaimed. "She never seems to take any interest in anything or anybody around her. In fact, we none of us can make her out. What do you think now is the reason of this strange reserve towards her own kindred?"

"Well, madam," I answered, "if I must tell you my real opinion, her nature is an uncommon one, and can only live in the society of other uncommon natures. Her silence I attribute to an excessive sensitiveness, which not rarely accompanies genius, and which proceeds from a consciousness that she is not easily understood."

"But surely, Mr. Blackdeed," said the lady of the house, "one would expect that she would open her heart to her own flesh and blood, rather than to a comparative stranger like yourself."

"The idiosyncrasies of temperament, madam," said I, "are difficult to explain. The mere accident of relationship will not necessarily give a similarity of disposition. Occasionally we do find one in a family totally unlike the rest, and therefore misunderstood by them. The reason why Miss Maud takes no interest in what is conventionally termed society is that she feels above it. She pants, as it were, for a higher atmosphere. For this reason she prefers lone rambles and the contemplation of beautiful nature, with no companion save her own thoughts, to the artificial society of the ball-room, with its insipid conversation.

"She evidently lives completely in a world of her own, into which she will admit but very few. To judge from her conversation, she seems excessively well read, and acquainted with authors who rarely form a part of a young lady's education. You must have observed that she reads very much. Indeed, I was perfectly astounded at her research, as well as the originality of her remarks."

"Ah!" sighed the mother, "she is a very odd girl. It is true that she is always reading. I have seen some strange books, too, in her library, but to tell you the truth, Mr. Blackdeed, neither myself nor any of the family ever thought for a moment that she really had anything in her.

Her sisters look upon her as a perfect ninny."

"A great mistake," I observed; "and if you will take my advice, you will try to understand her better. It may be difficult at first to get into her confidence. It is a nature that requires great sympathy and encouragement and if once ridiculed at any idea she expressed, which to you might appear strange or wild, you may be sure that she will close the doors of her confidence upon you once again and for ever."