Mary Seaham Volume I Part 12

"Cake! is there any cake?" exclaimed the old gentleman, looking round in doubtful search of this reported, and as it would have seemed, unexpected and unusual adjunct to his table.

"Oh, of course," Eugene replied, smiling; "all young ladies like cake, and Marryott knows that too well not to have supplied Miss Seaham with one to-day."

"But Marryott," said the old man, somewhat sharply, "did not know till this morning that we were to have ladies to luncheon. You did not tell her till this morning. Eh? How, then, could she have had one made in time?"

"Well then, Marryott is a prophetess, for, at any rate, here is a cake, and a capital one too," the son added, with a little quick impatience in his tone, though at the same time losing none of the respectful consideration, ever peculiarly observable in his manner towards his eccentric old father.

"Formerly, they used to make me cakes and all sort of good things to take to school when I was a boy; why, I wonder, are these, as well as many other good things, now denied me?" Eugene continued, laughing.

"Because you do not deserve them, I suppose," playfully rejoined Mrs. de Burgh.

"I suppose so," he answered rather quickly, a flush pa.s.sing across his brow, whilst a slight glance was directed towards Mary, as if conscience suggested to his secret soul, one of those whispers which sometimes disturb the proud heart of man in his most careless moments.

"How, then, are you deserving of this good, best thing you are about to appropriate to yourself?"

Perhaps, too, for at the slightest word, "How many thoughts are stirred," his own careless question might suggest this one reply:

"And where is she, the fond, the faithful, and unselfish administrator to the tastes and pleasures of your boyhood--your thoughtless, selfish, slighting boyhood?--that gentle, excellent being, prized too little on earth, too soon forgotten in death, to whom, alas! you too seldom had recourse but when other resources failed you--who gave and did all unrebukingly, looking for nothing in return--never wearying of doing you good?"

"I think sometimes,"--are the words of gentle Charles Lamb--"could I recall the days that are gone, which amongst them should I choose? Not those 'merrier days' not 'the pleasant days of hope,' not those wanderings with a fair-haired maid, which I have so often and so feelingly regretted, but the days of a mother's fondness for her schoolboy. What would I give to call her back for _one_ day, on my knees to ask her pardon for all those little asperities of temper, which from time to time have given her gentle spirit pain."

We do not know--we only imagine--we only hope that some such reflections might have suggested themselves to Trevor's mind, for they are those which, however unfrequently indulged--like the droppings on a stone, or as angel's visits, few and far between--cannot leave the heart less hard than the nether millstone--less unredeemable than the forsaken reprobate--quite uninfluenced by their softening power, and the careless words which almost uninterruptedly followed this under current of thought, no way militates against our hopes and wishes on that score--for it is by the careless, outward sign that the deep utterance of the heart is oftenest disguised.

"Olivia," he continued, as he proceeded to cut the cake, "shall I give you some? No? Ah, I forgot, married ladies, I observe, seldom do eat cake;" and he sent round the plate to Mary, whilst Mr. Trevor, though he still kept his eye curiously fixed on the object of discussion, as if he could not yet quite reconcile to his mind the phenomenon of its production, was not ungratified to hear Mary praise it, and finally consented to taste a piece, in obedience to her recommendation; p.r.o.nouncing himself perfectly satisfied with its merits, inasmuch--as it certainly was not too rich.

Independently of the natural promptings of her disposition, which would have led Mary under any circ.u.mstances, to pay every amiable and respectful attention to one of Mr. Trevor's age and circ.u.mstances, it had been certainly her anxious desire on this peculiar occasion to find favour in the eyes of Eugene's father, and to this effect--to make herself--as the phrase goes--as agreeable as possible; an endeavour all must know, in which--when the heart has so dear an interest as in the present case--it requires no great art or effort to engage _con amore_, and Mary's time and attention thus employed upon the father, it was not very often, though we cannot vouch for how often, her thoughts might have turned in that direction, that she suffered her eyes to wander down the long table towards the son, unless especially addressed.

Perhaps she might not feel quite bold enough as yet to brave the observation of her father-in-law elect in this manner, and it was easy to discover that Mr. Trevor's sharp anxious glances, were of no un.o.bservant a character, therefore it certainly happened that when her eyes did venture to turn from his immediate vicinity, they were oftenest raised towards an object, upon which it was to be imagined, she might gaze _ad libitum_, without risk of incurring suspicion or animadversion.

It was one of the family portraits, lining the walls of the s.p.a.cious apartment, and hanging over the fire-place, facing where she sat; not one of the quiet gentlemen in brown lace adorned suits, and powdered bag wigs, but one whose habiliments p.r.o.nounced him a warrior of still earlier date; and by that n.o.ble countenance, Mary's eyes might be seen very frequently attracted, so much so, that towards the close of the repast, when the servants had retired, Mrs. de Burgh called out, across the table:

"Mary, Eugene is quite jealous--that is to say," correcting herself, "Eugene is very anxious to know whether you have quite lost your heart to that gallant ancestor of his over the mantelpiece, for it seems to attract your most earnest interest and attention?"

Mary smiled.

"Not quite," she said, "though he is very handsome, I confess; but what most drew my attention to the picture, is its extreme likeness to a person with whom I am acquainted."

"Indeed!" Eugene exclaimed gaily, "well I cannot say that much mends the matter, does it, Olivia? A likeness to a person Miss Seaham has seen--a likeness too, she owns so handsome, attracting so much interest and attention, that we have scarcely had one glance cast upon us all this long time. We must really make some further enquiries about this 'person.'"

Mary responded to this fond raillery of her lover by an affectionate beaming smile, whilst Mr. Trevor in whose mind his son's words did not appear to awaken any suspicions, began for Mary's edification, to give an account of the name, birth, parentage and exploits of the warrior in question; which Mrs. de Burgh and Eugene interrupted, in the midst, by rising and moving from the table, and the former proposing that they should take Mary to show her over some parts of the house and gardens.

Whereupon the old gentleman expressed his fears that they would find all the rooms worth seeing, "shut, and covered up, and cold--very cold"

(though in truth they could not have been much colder than the one in which they now found themselves) "and the garden very desolate"--and then he went off to his library.

CHAPTER XIV.

And side by side the lovers sate,

Their talk was of the future; from the height Of Hope, they saw the landscape bath'd in light, And where the golden dimness veil'd the gaze, Guess'd out the spot, and marked the sites of happy days.

THE NEW TIMON.

Then once more was Eugene at Mary's side, congratulating himself that the separation from one another--which the stupidity of the servants, out of practice in anything like civilized entertainments had occasioned them was over.

"Is not that flattering, considering who was his partner in this isolation, as he calls it?" replied Mrs. de Burgh. "Stupidity, not at all! poor old Richard wished to do us honour, and he thought he could not do so to greater perfection than by putting us into the largest, coldest room, and at the longest table. Besides it could not have been better arranged, for other reasons. How well you got on with Uncle Trevor, Mary; we see that he is quiet charmed with you already."

"I fear I have had little time or opportunity as yet to win or merit any such unqualified approbation," Mary replied, "though I may hope, that in time,"--looking at Eugene with a smile.

"Oh, I a.s.sure you," interposed Mrs. de Burgh, laughing, "that you did a great deal in that short time. First of all you fully proved to my uncle that your appet.i.te was of no formidable dimensions, (I know he holds mine of old in horror) not greatly above that of a sparrow. Then you only took a thimble full of wine; and he obtained full a.s.surance that you had not been in London for ages--had no great longing to go there at all--had been accustomed, and indeed did, prefer the country; and therefore he need have no fear--when the truth is broken to him--of Eugene's being dragged off by you to London every season, his money squandered, as he fancies my husband's is (I wish, indeed, it was so squandered) upon hotel-bills and opera boxes! Oh, you did it capitally, Mary! did she not Eugene?"

"Olivia is too bad, is she not?" was Eugene's reply, having--during Mrs.

de Burgh's speech--been gazing with a fond smile into the expressive countenance of his betrothed, as she listened, half amused--half surprised and shocked, to her cousin's unceremonious ridicule of her uncle's peculiarities before his son.

"She is too bad," he continued, "and will give you but a poor idea of what you may expect in this house; when, of course, everything would be set on a very different train on your becoming its inmate."

And Eugene took the hand of his betrothed within his own with such tender affection, that Mrs. de Burgh began to experience something of the uncomfortable sensation of feeling herself _de trop_, to which _chaperones_, or any third person, under similar circ.u.mstances, are apt to be exposed. So she proposed an immediate adjournment, deeming this the best measure to be adopted for promoting a more comfortable position of affairs.

They accordingly proceeded through some of the large apartments, handsome rooms, for the most part, though covered and shut up, and as Mr. Trevor had reported, "cold, very cold." Mrs. de Burgh at least found them so, and Trevor having proposed to show Mary a more pleasant and habitable room, which he thought she would prefer, Mrs. de Burgh applauded the plan, and accompanied them up the staircase, but in the gallery suddenly remembered that she had something particular to say to Marryott, and adding that she would go and look for her, and return to them in the boudoir, when they might go out to walk, she left the lovers alone together. Trevor accordingly proceeded to lead Mary in the direction of the room thus specified.

There were pictures on the walls of the corridor through which they pa.s.sed, and one of these Mary would fain have waited more particularly to survey.

It was a large oil painting, representing a group composed of three boys, from about the ages of ten to fourteen. One, apparently the eldest, was mounted on a handsome pony, the reins of which were held by the second, the most striking in appearance of the party, and whose fine animated countenance was turned eagerly aside towards the third and youngest, a dark-haired, dark-eyed little fellow, carrying a cricket-bat in his hand. A large Newfoundland dog completed the picture.

"Yes," Trevor said, in answer to the look of interest and half-uttered enquiry which a glimpse of the painting drew forth from Mary, "that gentleman with the bat was intended to represent my hopeful self."

But there was something of constraint in the smile which accompanied, and in the tone in which he uttered these words, which instinctively caused Mary to pa.s.s on without further demonstration of the wish she felt to pause for its closer inspection.

There might be, for aught she knew, some melancholy a.s.sociations connected with the brother, she remembered he had lost, perhaps even with the one still living, but concerning whom she had as yet heard so little, and to whom she could not help, from that very cause, attaching the existence of some mystery. But at any rate, she had ascertained that Eugene was not the eldest son.

Their course was destined to meet with one other interruption. They suddenly came upon a remarkable looking woman, tall, and rather handsomely dressed, with remains of considerable beauty, though now apparently past fifty.

Mary at once concluded her to be the Marryott of whom she had heard previous mention, though the ideas she had formed respecting that personage were rather of a more venerable and old fas.h.i.+oned looking person--a housekeeper of the old school, in sweeping serge, high starched cap, and ma.s.sive bunches of keys at her girdle.

She had, however, a kindly smile, and some few gracious words ready for this--from all she had heard and imagined--old and faithful servant of the family, who drew back with all due deference to let her young master and his fair companion pa.s.s.

But Trevor did not testify much more inclination to pause here than he had showed before the picture; he merely said, _en pa.s.sant_, acknowledging her presence by a hasty glance:

"Oh, Marryott, Mrs. de Burgh has gone to look for you. I want to show Miss Seaham the boudoir; I suppose the door is open?"

The woman answered civilly that it was, though she was sorry to say there was no fire lighted, and they proceeded on their way.

The room which the happy pair finally entered was indeed of a more pleasant, and alluring aspect than any Mary had yet seen. The whole brightness at present pervading the mansion, appeared concentrated within its walls, for all want of fire was supplied by the genial warmth the afternoon suns.h.i.+ne emitted through the pleasant window, near to which Eugene and Mary at once seated themselves, to enjoy under these auspicious circ.u.mstances the first _tete-a-tete_ interview afforded them since their engagement.

"This is a pretty room, is it not?" Eugene remarked.