Under the Mendips Part 12

"But you are not going to read _that_, Joyce," Piers said. "Isn't it dull? Can't you find the Pilgrim's Progress?"

"Yes," exclaimed Harry; "I like the Giant Despair part, and the history of all the bones and skulls lying about."

"I will read about a giant," Joyce said, "a very pretty story from the Bible."

"Oh! I know," said Ralph; "very well, I don't mind hearing it again."

Joyce seated herself with her brothers round her, and read the familiar Bible story, with a somewhat slow utterance, but with so much dramatic power in the tones of her voice that her listeners were profoundly attentive. Then she talked to them about David, and said she had read that the story was a type of the great battle we had all to fight against the giant of self. She did not know that she had another listener till her brothers had dispersed, and she was left on the seat with the Bible in her hand. Then Mr. Arundel came through the little gate leading from the copse, and looking up at Joyce, said:

"May I come nearer?"

Joyce started to her feet.

"Take care," she said; "the gra.s.s is very dry and slippery;" and as Gilbert Arundel made a rather scrambling ascent, Joyce advanced and held out her hand to him to help him up the last few yards.

"I have been in hiding behind that tree by the gate," he said; "I did not like to disturb the boys by my presence, after the pains you had taken to keep them quiet."

Joyce's colour rose, and she said:

"I would rather you had let me know you were listening, especially when I was talking to the boys."

"Do not be vexed with me," Mr. Arundel said. "I am so glad to have found you here alone."

"I wanted to speak to you, too," she said, quickly, "about my brother; he is"--she stopped, and then went on; "I think I may say it to you--he is the one cloud over our happy life here at Fair Acres. It used not to be so; he was very different once."

"Yes," Mr. Arundel said, "I can quite imagine it was so. Your brother is very weak of purpose, and he got into a bad set at the university where I found him."

"What made you care for him?" Joyce said, simply; "you are so different from him."

"Well, the story is rather a long one, and I do not know that all of it is fit for your ears, or that I ought to inflict it upon you. Still I think you should know something about it. I feel an interest in poor Melville much the same interest which a man takes in anything that has cost him some trouble."

"What made you take any trouble about him?" Joyce asked.

"I scarcely know; pity, I think, began it; and who could help pitying him? He got into the hands of an unprincipled man, much older than himself, who is, in fact, a relative of mine, and I did what I could to get him out of his clutches. He got all his money out of him, and then persuaded him to gamble to get more; of course ending in losing it."

"How dreadful!" Joyce exclaimed. "Does father know?"

"He knows about the money part, of course; about the debts and difficulties."

"Yes," Joyce exclaimed, with a sigh, "and it has troubled him greatly."

"What I wanted to say to you was, that I think if Melville went abroad, as he wishes, it might be a good thing, provided a safe companion could be found for him."

"Will you go?" Joyce said, eagerly.

"No, it is impossible; I could not leave my mother: I am all she has in the world. We are going to live in Bristol, where I am to be articled to a good firm of lawyers, and perhaps I may study afterwards for the bar."

"I thought you were of high family," Joyce said innocently.

"Would that prevent my taking to law?" Gilbert asked, with a smile.

"No; I don't know exactly why it should do so," she said. "Melville talks so much about things which are right for a gentleman to do, and things which a gentleman cannot do; and then he dresses so fashionably, and people remark upon it."

"I don't wonder," Gilbert said, laughing; "but that part of his proceedings is only laughable. Many men are fops in their youth who tone down wonderfully when they get old. Let us hope it will be so with him."

"You know," Joyce said, "that Melville ought to spare father expenses instead of adding to them. There have been two bad harvests and hard winters, and Mr. Watson, the steward, is getting rather past his work.

Melville ought to take that place now, and save father, for there is Ralph to be educated, and he ought to have the _best_, for he is so studious; and then there are the three other boys, and poor Piers is lame, and they all want something."

"You don't seem to want anything yourself," Mr. Arundel said.

"No: I have a happy home and everything is beautiful about me. What _can_ I want?"

"Not to go to London, or Bath, or to see the world?" he asked.

"I think," said Joyce, simply, "if it came in my way--I mean if there was plenty of money--I should like to travel a little. Can you believe that I have only been to Bath once and to Bristol twice in my life? and I am nearly eighteen. My Cousin Charlotte, who lives at Wells with my aunt, has been to school in Bath, but father never wished me to go to school, so I have no accomplishments. But I need not talk any more about myself, it cannot be interesting."

Gilbert Arundel was beginning a speech to the effect that what she said was most interesting to him, but somehow it died away on his lips. The sweet earnestness of the face which he had been watching while she spoke, the entire absence of self-consciousness, seemed to lift her above the level of compliments or flattery, which the gentlemen of the time considered the rightful inheritance of the young ladies, with whom they trifled for an hour's amus.e.m.e.nt.

As she sat with her face towards the beautiful landscape over which the westering sun was casting its level rays, she seemed so far above him and bearing the "lily in her hand" of which a poet of later days than those in which Joyce lived has said that--

"Gates of bra.s.s cannot withstand One touch of that enchanted wand."

The silence which fell over Gilbert was unbroken for a few minutes by any word on either side. At last Joyce said:

"Is there anything I can do for Melville? He has rather a way of looking down on me, and I think I speak crossly to him sometimes. I wish you would tell me if you think I could help father about him."

"If he does not listen to _you_ I should think it hopeless that he would listen to anyone," Gilbert said; "he has a way of looking down on most people."

"Not on _you_?" Joyce said, with a little innocent laugh. "He made us think you were very grand and that we must alter all our ways to suit you; poor mother was to change the hours for meals, and----"

"I never heard such nonsense," Gilbert said; "but I know where he got those notions from, and I may tell you this much, that the kindest thing you can do is to ask your father, to consent to his going abroad for a year as soon as may be; he will be out of harm's way. I have had some fears that the person who had such an evil influence over him might follow him here, and I was determined to circ.u.mvent him."

"It was very kind of you to take this trouble. Who is the person?"

"He is a step-uncle of mine; my mother's half-brother, Lord Maythorne."

"Quite a grand person, then?" Joyce said.

"Grand in his own eyes; yes, undoubtedly; but there is every hope that, having got what he can out of Melville, he will leave him alone. You do not know how ashamed I am to own him as a relation; and I am anxious to do all I can to atone for the mischief he may have done your brother."

"Was he at Oxford with Melville?"

"No: but, unhappily, he has a small place near Oxford, and was continually coming in."

"Shall I tell father all about what you have told me?"

"I have told him already a good deal. What I want you to do is to use every effort to persuade your father to let Melville start soon."