The Shadow of Ashlydyat Part 140

"Yes," she sobbed.

"Good, and gentle, and kind, and lady-like,--and remembering always that there's another world, and that mamma has gone on to it. I should like to have kept you with me, Meta, but it cannot be: I must go out alone.

You will not quite forget me, will you?"

She put up her hand and her face to his, and moaned in her pain. George laid his aching brow on hers. He knew that it might be the last time they should meet on earth.

"I shall write to you by every mail, Meta, and you must write to me. You can put great capital letters together now, and that will do to begin with. And," his voice faltered, "when you walk by mamma's grave on Sundays--and see her name there--you will remember her--and me. You will think how we are separated: mamma in heaven; I, in a far-off land; you here: but you know the separation will not be for ever, and each week will bring us nearer to its close--its close in some way. If--if we never meet again on earth, Meta----"

"Oh don't, papa! I want you to come back to me."

He choked down his emotion. He took the little face in his hands and kissed it fervently: in that moment, in his wrung feelings, he almost wished he had no beloved child to abandon.

"You must be called by your own name now. I should wish it. Meta was all very well," he continued, half to himself, "when _she_ was here; that the names should not interfere with each other. Be a good child, my darling. Be very obedient to Aunt Cecil, as you used to be to mamma."

"Aunt Cecil is not mamma," said Meta, her little heart swelling.

"No, my darling, but she will be to you as mamma, and she and Lord Averil will love you very much. I wish--I wish I could have kept you with me, Meta!"

She wished it also. If ever a child knew what an aching heart was, she knew it then.

"And now I must go," he added--for indeed he did not care to prolong the pain. "I shall write to you from London, Meta, and I shall write you quite a packet when I am on board ship. You must get on well with your writing, so as to be able soon to read my letters yourself. Farewell, farewell, my darling child!"

How long she clung to him; how long he kept her clinging, he gave no heed. When the emotion on both sides was spent, he took her by the right hand and led her to the next room. Lady Averil came forward.

"Cecil," he said, his voice quiet and subdued, "she must be called Maria now--in remembrance of her mother."

"Yes," said Cecil eagerly. "We should all like it. Sit down, George.

Lord Averil has stepped out somewhere, but he will not be long."

"I cannot stay. I shall see him outside, I dare say. If not, he will come to the station. Will you say to him----"

A low burst of tears from the child interrupted the sentence. George, in speaking to Cecil, had loosed her hand, and she laid her head down on a sofa to cry. He took her up in his arms, and she clung to him tightly: it was only the old scene over again, and George felt that they were not alone now. He imprinted a last kiss upon her face, and gave her to his sister.

"She had better be taken away, Cecil."

Lady Averil, with many loving words, carried her outside the door, sobbing as she was, and called to her maid. "Be very kind to her," she whispered. "It is a sad parting. And--Harriet--henceforth she is to be called by her proper name--Maria."

"She will get over it in a day or two, George," said Lady Averil, returning.

"Yes, I know that," he answered, his face turned from Cecil. "Cherish the remembrance of her mother within her as much as you possibly can, Cecil: I should wish her to grow up like Maria."

"If you would only stay a last hour with us!"

"I can't; I can't: it is best that I should go. I do not know what the future may bring forth," he lingered to say, "Whether I shall come home--or live to come home, or she, when she is older, come out to me: it is all uncertain."

"Were I you, George, I would not indulge the thought of the latter. She will be better here--as it seems to me."

"Yes--there's no doubt of it. But the separation is a cruel one.

However--the future must be left. G.o.d bless you, Cecil! and thank you ever for your kindness."

The tears rolled down her cheeks as he bent to kiss her. "George," she whispered timidly--"if I might only ask you one question."

"Ask me anything."

"Is--have you any intention--shall you be likely to think of--of replacing Maria by Charlotte Pain--of making her your wife?"

"Replacing _Maria by her_!" he echoed, his face flushing. "Heaven forgive you for thinking it!"

The question cured George's present emotion more effectually than anything else could have done. But his haughty anger against Cecil was unreasonable, and he felt that it was so.

"Forgive me, my dear: but it sounded so like an insult to my dear wife.

Be easy: _she_ will never replace Maria."

In the porch, as George went out, he met Lord Averil hastening in. Lord Averil would have put his arm within George's to walk with him through the grounds, but George drew back.

"No, not to-night: let me go alone. I am not fit for companionship.

Good-night. Good-bye," he added, his voice hoa.r.s.e. "I thought to say a word of grat.i.tude to you, for the past, for the present, but I cannot.

If I live----"

"Don't say 'if,' George: go away with a good heart, and take my best wishes with you. A new land and a new life! you may yet live down the past."

Their hands lingered together in a firm pressure, and George turned away from Ashlydyat for the last time. Ashlydyat that might have been his.

CHAPTER IX.

A SAFE VOYAGE TO HIM!

Was it ever your fate or fortune to be on board an Indian vessel when it was just about to start? If so, there's no doubt you retain a more vivid than agreeable reminiscence of the reigning confusion. Pa.s.sengers coming on at the last moment and going frantic over their luggage or the discovered inconveniences of their cabins; cords and ropes creaking and coiling; sailors shouting, officers commanding; boxes shooting up from the boats to the deck, and to your feet, only in turn to be shot down again to the hold!--it is Bedlam gone frantic, and nothing less.

On a fine ship, anch.o.r.ed off Gravesend, this scene was taking place on a crisp day early in January. A bright, inspiriting, sunny day, giving earnest--if there's anything in the popular belief--of a bright voyage.

One gentleman stood aloof from the general _melee_. He had been on board half an hour or more; had seen to his cabin, his berth, his baggage--as much of the latter as he could see to; and now stood alone watching the turmoil. Others, pa.s.sengers, had come on board in groups, surrounded by hosts of friends; he came alone: a tall and very distinguished-looking man, attired in the deepest mourning, with a grey plaid crossed on his shoulder.

As if jealous that the ship should have all the confusion to itself, the sh.o.r.e was getting up a little on its own account. Amidst the drays, the trucks, the carts: amidst the cases and packages, which were heaped on the bank, not all, it was to be hoped, for that ship, or she would never get off to-day; amidst the numerous crowds of living beings, idlers and workers, that such a scene brings together, there came something into the very throng of them, scattering everything that could be scattered right and left.

An exceedingly remarkable carriage, of the style that may be called "dashing," especially if height be any criterion, its wheels red and green, its horses of high mettle, and a couple of fierce dogs barking and leaping round it. The scattered people looked up in astonishment to see a lady guiding those horses, and deemed at first that the sun, shining right into their eyes, had deceived; them: pawing, snorting, prancing, fiery animals; which, far from being spent by their ten or twelve miles journey, looked as if they were eager to start upon another. The lady managed them admirably. A very handsome lady was she, of the same style as the carriage; dashing, with jet-black eyes, large and free, and a scarlet feather in her hat that might have been found nearly thirty-six inches long, had it been measured from top to tip. A quiet little gentleman, slight and fair, sat beside her, and a groom lounged grandly with folded arms in the back seat. She, on her high cushions, was almost a yard above either of them: the little gentleman in fact was completely eclipsed: and she held the reins in her white gauntleted hands and played gallantly with the whip, perfectly at ease, conscious that she was those foaming steeds' master. Suddenly, without the least warning, she drew them back on their haunches.

"There she is! in the middle of the stream. Can't you read it, Dolf?

_The Indus._ How stupid of the people to tell us she was lying lower down!"

Jumping from the carriage without waiting to be a.s.sisted, she left the groom in charge and made her way to the pier, condescendingly taking the gentleman's arm as she hastened up it, and hissing off the dogs as a hint that they were to remain behind. I am sure you cannot need an introduction to either of these people, but you shall have it for all that; Mr and Mrs. Rodolf Pain.

She, Charlotte, did all the acting, and the talking too. Her husband had always been retiring in manner, as you may remember; and he had grown far more retiring than he used to be. Charlotte bargained for a boat: and they were pulled to the ship's side.

For a few moments they had to take their chance; they made only two more in the general confusion; but Charlotte seized upon a handsome young man with a gold band upon his cap, who was shouting out orders.