The Squire of Sandal-Side Part 3

"You mean, you have been writing to Tom about a marriage? I would have been above a thing like that, William. I suppose you did it to please your mother. She always did hanker after Tom, and she always did dislike the Latriggs. I have heard that when people were in the grave they 'ceased from troubling,' but"--

"Alice!"

"I meant no harm, squire, I'm sure; and I would not say wrong of the dead for any thing, specially of your mother; but I think about my own girls."

"There, now, Alice, don't whimper and cry. I am not going to harm your girls, not I. Only mother was promised that Tom's son should have the first chance for their favor. I'm sure there's nothing amiss in that.

Eh?"

"A young man born in a foreign country among blacks, or very near blacks. And n.o.body knows who his mother was."

"Oh, yes! his mother was a judge's daughter, and she had a deal of money. Her son has been well done to; sent to the very best German and French schools, and now he is at Oxford. I dare say he is a very good young man, and at any rate he is the only Sandal of this generation except our own boy."

"Your sisters have sons."

"Yes, Mary has three: they are _Lockerbys_. Elizabeth has two: they are _Piersons_. My poor brother Launcie was drowned, and never had son or daughter; so that Tom's Julius is the nearest blood we have."

"Julius! I never heard tell of such a name."

"Yes, it is a silly kind of a foreign name. His mother is called Julia: I suppose that is how it comes. No Sandal was ever called such a name before, but the young man mustn't be blamed for his G.o.dfather's foolishness, Alice. Eh?"

"I'm not so unjust. Poor Launcie! I saw him once at a ball in Kendal.

Are you sure he was drowned?"

"I followed him to Whitehaven, and found out that he had gone away in a ship that never came home. Mother and Launcie were in bad bread when he left, and she never fretted for him as she did for Tom."

"Why did you not tell me all this before?"

"I said to myself, there's time enough yet to be planning husbands for girls that haven't a thought of the kind. We were very happy with them; I couldn't bear to break things up; and I never once feared about Steve Latrigg, not I."

"What does your brother and his wife say?"

"Tom is with me. As for his wife, I know nothing of her, and she knows nothing of us. She has been in England a good many times, but she never said she would like to come and see us, and my mother never wanted to see her; so there wasn't a compliment wasted, you see. Eh? What?"

"No, I don't see, William. All about it is in a muddle, and I must say I never heard tell of such ways. It is like offering your own flesh and blood for sale. And to people who want nothing to do with us. I'm astonished at you, squire."

"Don't go on so, Alice. Tom and I never had any falling out. He just got out of the way of writing. He likes India, and he had his own reasons for not liking England in any shape you could offer England to him.

There's no back reckonings between Tom and me, and he'll be glad for Julius to come to his own people. We will ask Julius to Sandal; and you say, yourself, that the half of young folks' loving is in being handy to each other. Eh? What?"

"I never thought you would bring my words up that way. But I'll tell you one thing, my girls are not made of melted wax, William. You'll be a wise man, and a strong man, if you get a ring on their fingers, if they don't want it there. Sophia will say very soft and sweet, 'No, thank you, father;' and you'll move Scawfell and Langdale Pikes before you get her beyond it. As for Charlotte, you yourself will stand 'making' better than she will. And you know that nothing short of an earthquake can lift you an inch outside your own way."

And perhaps Sandal thought the hyperbole a compliment; for he smiled a little, and walked away, with what his wife privately called "a peac.o.c.ky air," saying something about "Greek meeting Greek" as he did so. Mrs. Sandal did not in the least understand him: she wondered a little over the remark, and then dismissed it as "some of the squire's foolishness."

CHAPTER III.

JULIUS SANDAL.

"Variety's the very spice of life That gives it all its flavor."

"Domestic happiness, thou only bliss Of Paradise that has survived the fall."

Life has a chronology quite independent of the almanac. The heart divides it into periods. When the sheep-shearing had been forgotten by all others, the squire often looked back to it with longing. It was a boundary which he could never repa.s.s, and which shut him out forever from the happy days of his daughters' girlhood,--the days when they had no will but his will, and no pleasures but in his smile and companionship. His son Harry had never been to him what Sophia and Charlotte were. Harry had spent his boyhood in public schools, and, when his education was completed, had defied all the Sandal traditions, and gone into the army. At this time he was with his regiment,--the old Cameronian,--in Edinburgh. And in other points, besides his choice of the military profession, Harry had a.s.serted his will against his father's will. But the squire's daughters gave him nothing but delight.

He was proud of their beauty, proud of Charlotte's love of out-door pleasures, proud of Sophia's love of books; and he was immeasurably happy in their affection and obedience.

If Sandal had been really a wise man he would have been content with his good fortune; and like the happy Corinthian have only prayed, "O G.o.ddess, let the days of my prosperity continue!" But he had the self-sufficiency and impatience of a man who is without peer in his own small arena. He believed himself to be as capable of ordering his daughters' lives as of directing his sheep "walks," or the change of crops in his valley and upland meadows.

Suddenly it had been revealed to him, that Stephen Latrigg had found his way into a life he thought wholly his own. Until that moment of revelation he had liked Stephen; but he liked him no longer. He felt that Stephen had stolen the privilege he should have asked for, and he deeply resented the position the young man had taken. On the contrary, Stephen had been guilty of no intentional wrong. He had simply grown into an affection too sweet to be spoken of, too uncertain and immature to be subjected to the prudential rules of daily life; yet, had the question been plainly put to him, he would have gone at once to the squire, and said, "I love Charlotte, and I ask for your sanction to my love." He would have felt such an acknowledgment to be the father's most sacred and evident right, and he was thinking of making it at the very hour in which Sandal was feeling bitterly toward him for its omission.

And thus the old, old tragedy of mutual misunderstanding works to sorrowful ends.

The night of the sheep-shearing the squire could not sleep. To lay awake and peer into the future through the dark hours was a new experience, and it made him full of restless anxieties. Of course he expected Sophia and Charlotte to marry, but not just yet. He had so far persistently postponed the consideration of this subject, and he was angry at Stephen Latrigg for showing him that further delay might be dangerous to his own plans.

"A presumptuous young c.o.xcomb," he muttered. "Does he think that being 'top-shearer' gives him a right to make love to Charlotte Sandal?"

In the morning he wrote the following letter:--

NEPHEW JULIUS SANDAL,--I hear you are at Oxford, and I should think you would wish to make the acquaintance of your nearest relatives. They will be glad to see you at Seat-Sandal during the vacation, if your liking leads you that way. To hear soon from you is the hope of your affectionate uncle,

WILLIAM SANDAL, _of Sandal-Side_.

He finished the autograph with a broad flourish, and handed the paper to his wife. "What do you think of that, Alice? Eh? What?"

There was a short silence, then Mrs. Sandal laid the note upon the table. "I don't think over much of it, William. Good-fortune won't bear hurrying. Can't you wait till events ripen naturally?"

"And have all my plans put out of the way?"

"Are you sure that your plans are the best plans?"

"They will be a bit better than any Charlotte and Stephen Latrigg have made."

"I don't believe they have such a thing as a plan between them. But if you think so, send Charlotte to her aunt Lockerby for a few months. Love is just like fire: it goes out if it hasn't fuel."

"Nay, I want Charlotte here. After our Harry, Julius is the next heir, and I'm set on him marrying one of the girls. If he doesn't like Sophia he may like Charlotte. I have two chances then, and I'm not going to throw one away for Steve Latrigg's liking or loving. Don't you see, Alice? Eh? What?"

"No: I never was one to see beyond the horizon. But if you must have to-morrow in to-day, why then send off your letter. I would let 'well'

alone. When change comes to the door, it is time enough to ask it over the threshold. We are very happy now, William, and every happy day is so much certain gain in life."

"That is a woman's way of talking. A man looks for the future."

"And how seldom does he get what he looks for. But I know you, William Sandal. You will take your own way, be it good or bad; and what is more, you will make others take it with you."

"I am inviting my own nephew, Alice. Eh? What?"

"You know nothing about it. There are kin that are not kindred. You are inviting you know not who or what. But,"--and she pushed the letter towards him, with a gesture which seemed to say, "I am not responsible for the consequences."

The squire after a moment's thought accepted them. He went into the yard, humming a strain of "The Bay of Biscay," and gave the letter to a groom, with orders to take it at once to the post-office. Then he called Charlotte from the rose-walk. "The horses are saddled," he said, "and I want you to trot over to Dalton with me."