The Beautiful Wretch; The Pupil of Aurelius; and The Four Macnicols Part 1

The Beautiful Wretch; The Pupil of Aurelius; and The Four Macnicols.

by William Black.

CHAPTER I.

SINGING SAL.

On a certain golden afternoon in August, when the sea was as still and radiant as the vaulted blue overhead, and when the earth was lying so hushed and silent that you would have thought it was listening for the chirp of the small birds among the gorse, a young girl of about seventeen or so was walking over the downs that undulate, wave on wave, from Newhaven all along the coast to Brighton. This young lady was tall for her age; slim of form; and she had a graceful carriage; her face was fair and markedly freckled; her nose was piquant rather than cla.s.sical; her hair, which was of a ruddy gold hue, was rebellious, and strayed about her ears and neck in accidental wisps and rings: her grayish or gray-blue eyes were reserved and thoughtful rather than shrewd and observant. No, she was not beautiful; but she had a face that attracted interest; and though her look was timid and retiring, nevertheless her eyes could, on occasion, light up with a sudden humour that was inclined to be sarcastic. So busy, indeed, was she generally, on these solitary wanderings of hers, with her own thoughts and fancies, that sometimes she laughed to herself--a low, quiet little laugh that none but herself could hear.

This was Miss Anne Beresford, who was called by her sisters Nan. But it was an old friend of the family, and one of England's most famous sailors, who, at a very early period of her career, had bestowed on her the sobriquet of the Beautiful Wretch; and that partly because she was a pretty and winning child, and partly because she was in the habit of saying surprisingly irreverent things. Now, all children say irreverent things, simply because they read the highest mysteries by the light of their own small experiences; but Nan Beresford's guesses at the supernatural were more than usually audacious. When, for example, she arrived at the conclusion that fairies were never seen in the daytime for the reason that G.o.d had had them all 'fwied for his bweakfast,' it was clear that she was bringing a quite independent mind to bear on the phenomena of the universe around her. And then, of course, all sorts of sayings that she never uttered or thought of were attributed to her. Whenever a story was particularly wicked, it was sure to be put down to Nan Beresford. The old Admiral, who had at the outset given her that nickname, spent a great deal of time that might have been profitably employed otherwise in deliberately inventing impieties, each of which was bruited about in certain circles as 'Nan's last;' and if you happened to meet him anywhere between the United Service Club and Spring Gardens, completely self-absorbed, his face br.i.m.m.i.n.g over with laughter, you might be sure he was just putting on a finis.h.i.+ng touch. Rather than abandon one of these self-invented stories of his, I think he would have parted with any half-dozen of his crosses and medals; but indeed this last would not have been difficult, for he had served in every part of the world where a s.h.i.+p would float, and honours and dignities had been showered upon him.

Naturally, there came a time when these stories had to cease; but Nan Beresford preserved her independent way of looking at things, and she was clearly the clever one of the family. Moreover, with all her retiring ways, she was always quite capable of holding her own. Her elder sisters were handsome, and a good many young gentlemen, amongst others, came about the house; some of whom, thinking to be facetious, would occasionally begin to tease Miss Nan, she being the youngest admitted to lunch or afternoon tea. But this shy, freckled young person, whose eyes could laugh up so quickly, had a nimbleness of wit and dexterity of fence that usually left her antagonist exceedingly sorry. One can imagine a gay young swallow darting about in the evening, having quite satisfied himself as to food, and thinking only in his frolicsome way of chevying and frightening the innocent insect tribe. But what if, by dire mischance, he should dart at something and find he had seized--a wasp! Some of the merry young gentlemen were glad to leave the Beautiful Wretch alone.

However, all these things must now be looked upon as bygones.

Seventeen has come; its dignity and seriousness have followed upon the frolics of untutored youth; and the sweet charm of maidenhood has smoothed down such angularities as were formerly permissible. If Miss Anne Beresford shows her independence now, it is mostly in a sort of half-declared contempt of sentimentalities and flirtations--of which, to be sure, she sees a good deal around her. She likes to be alone; she reads much; she has ideas; she wors.h.i.+ps Mr. Huxley; and she needs no other company than her own when she goes off on long explorations of curving sh.o.r.e or inland vale. On this particular afternoon, for example, she was walking all the way to Brighton from Newhaven, having already walked to the latter place in the morning; and as her light and free step carried her over the close, warm, thyme-scented turf, she was smiling to herself--at some incident, no doubt, that her memory had recalled.

Well, at this moment some one addressed her.

'Young lady!'

She had been vaguely aware that a woman was sitting there, by the side of some furze bushes; but she had kept her eyes away, being a little afraid of tramps. On being challenged, however, she turned and looked, and then she saw that this was no ordinary tramp, but an itinerant musician well known along the south coast by the name of Singing Sal.

She was a good-looking, trimly-dressed, strapping wench of five-and-twenty, with a sun-tanned face, brilliant white teeth when she laughed, and big brown eyes that were at once friendly and audacious in their scrutiny. She looked indeed more like a farmer's daughter dressed for market-day; but on one side of her, on the green-sward, lay a guitar; and on the other, a little leather wallet that she had unstrapped. Apparently she had been having a nap on this warm afternoon, for she was smoothing down her black hair.

'I beg your pardon, Miss,' she said, with very great respect, but with a sort of timidly friendly look in her eyes, 'but I have often seen you as you was walking along the downs; and many's the time I have wished to have a word with you, if there was n.o.body by. Yes, and many's the time I have thought about you.'

Nan Beresford hesitated for a second whether she should stay or not.

But she knew this young woman very well by sight; and her appearance and manner were alike extremely prepossessing. Nan had heard her sing, but never speak; and she was surprised by the correct way in which she spoke; she had scarcely anything of the Suss.e.x intonation.

'Yes,' said Singing Sal, looking up at the young lady, 'many's the time that I have thought I should like to tell you what I've been thinking about you, as I saw you go by. I've often been thinking that if one could only see into it, the mind of a young lady like you--brought up like you in the middle of nothing but kindness and goodness--why, it must be the most beautiful thing in the world. Just like that out there--clear and silver-like.'

She nodded in the direction of the sea--where the pale blue plain was touched here and there with silver and golden reflections. Nan was embarra.s.sed; nevertheless she remained. There was something winning about the fresh-coloured, frank-eyed la.s.s.

'And I think I have seen a little bit into your mind, Miss,' said she, with a smile. 'Would you look at this--if I may make so bold?'

There was a bit of red silk round her neck, and attached to it was a florin. She held up the perforated coin, and glanced at the face of the young girl. Nan Beresford blushed.

'You remember, Miss? That was the night as I was singing in front of the Old s.h.i.+p, though what I did that for I don't know; I prefer my own friends and my own haunts. But do you know what I said to myself when I got to my lodgings that night? I said, "What was the young lady thinking of when she gave you that florin? It wasn't an accident; for she took it carefully out of her purse. And it wasn't because she thought you were starving; for you don't look like that. No, she gave it to you that you might think it enough for one night's earnings, and go away home, and not be stared at any longer by a crowd of men. That was what the young lady was thinking in her mind; and if ever you spend that two s.h.i.+llings, Sal, you'll be a mean wretch." And many's the time I thought I would like to speak to ye, Miss, if only as it might be to ask your name.'

This woman was frank even to boldness in her scrutiny, and her manner was rough and ready; but there was a touch of something fine about her--something true, downright, unmistakable--that somehow won people's confidence. Nan Beresford drew nearer to her, though she remained standing.

'Is there anything----?' said Nan; and then she stopped. She was about to ask if there was anything she could do for this new acquaintance; but she suddenly reflected that the young woman was smartly dressed and apparently well-to-do. Singing Sal quickly broke in on her embarra.s.sment.

'Yes,' she said, smiling, 'you don't like my making a show of myself--singing for coppers in the street. But isn't there worse than that among the people you live among, Miss? Mind, I see life in the rough; I can't always choose my company; and I have to take things as they come; but when I hear of very fine young ladies--mind, not poor girls driven by starvation, or forced to support a sick mother, or kicked out of doors by a drunken father--and these fine ladies going and selling themselves for so many thousands a year and a swell carriage--well, it sounds queer, I think. But I'm sure, Miss,' she said, regarding the girl, 'you won't make a marriage for money. You don't look like that.'

Again Nan Beresford flushed hastily; and she said, with a touch of anger, 'I prefer not to speak of such things. I am tired of listening to women who can talk of nothing but sweethearts and marriage. Surely there are other matters of as much importance----'

But then it occurred to her that this was scarcely civil; so she turned to this pleasant-looking stranger and said, with a grave courtesy, 'I presume you are returning to Brighton?'

'Yes, I am.'

'To remain there?'

Sal laughed in her quiet way.

'Lord love you, my dear young lady, I never saw the town yet that could hold me for more than a couple o' nights. I live in the open. This is what I like best--open sea, open sky, open downs. I do believe my forefathers were either gipsies, or else they had had a good dose o'

the treadmill; for I'm never content but when I'm on the trudge--wet weather or fine, all's the same to me; but foursquare walls I can't endure.'

'I am afraid you must lead a very solitary life,' said Nan, with sincere compa.s.sion.

'Why, bless you, Miss, the world is full of things, said the other cheerfully; 'and as you tramp along there's always something turning up for you to look at. Oh, I've plenty of friends, too, for the matter of that. I bring a bit of news to the farms, and sometimes toys for the coastguardsmen's children--else the women would get jealous; and I have an eye for the mackerel-shoals, for the fishermen; and I know where the sailors are, if there's any sport going on. Yes, I have a good many friends, Miss. I can tell you it would be a bad business for any one who laid a finger on me, anywheres between Dover and Portsmouth; I think the word would be pa.s.sed along pretty quick. Not that I can't take care o' myself,' added Sal with a modest smile. 'I'm not afraid to be out o' nights, when I know where my bed is; and sometimes I can do without that. Why, that is the best of all the tramps--a clear moonlight night along these downs; and you have the whole world to yourself; everything and everybody asleep, except maybe a watchdog up at one of the farms. And the s.h.i.+ps out at sea--you can tell whether they're going up or down Channel by the red or the green light, and you think of the poor chap at the helm, and hope he'll get soon home to his wife and children. That is a real fine tramp, Miss; you want to sing almost, and yet it's too beautiful to be broken by a sound. And then there's a fortnight in the Spring when the birds come over--oh! that's wonderful. If you start about half-past two or a quarter to three, you get in amongst them; and the first thing you hear is the whistle, quick, and sharp, and yet far away, of the curlews. Then you begin to feel that they are pa.s.sing overhead; you can't see anything; it is like a whisper filling all the air; the darkness is just full of wings--soft and soft; you're afraid to put up your hand in case you might hurt some poor creature at the end of its long voyage; and you listen and listen as you walk along, waiting for the gray daylight in the east, to show them where to pick up some food in the fields. Ah! Miss, if you only had the courage to rise as early as that----'

'Oh, I will--I will!' said Nan eagerly, quite forgetting what her mother might have to say about this strange acquaintance. 'But what has made you take to such a way of living? You are very well educated.'

'You are kind to say so, Miss,' remarked Singing Sal, who was evidently greatly pleased. 'But it's little education I ever got, except from two or three books I have made companions of, like. I kept my father's shop in Tunbridge until he married a second time; then it grew too hot for me, rather; and so I took to the road, and I've never regretted it.

Human nature is what I like to look at; and if I may make so bold as to say it, I guess there's more human nature among the poor folk than among the rich. But I'll tell you about that some other time,' she added, returning to her ordinary free-and-easy manner. 'I see you want to go. You've looked at your watch twice.'

'But you're going to Brighton also?' said Nan, somewhat timidly.

'Not with you, Miss,' was the prompt reply. 'No, no. But perhaps, if it is not making too free, you will be so friendly as to tell me your name?'

'My name is Anne Beresford, and I live in Brunswick Terrace,' said Nan.

'Thank ye kindly, Miss,' said Singing Sal, regarding the young lady with great friendliness and respect. 'Maybe I shall see you some other day on the downs, for I think you are as fond of them as I am myself.

Good-bye, Miss.'

She rose with some sense of natural courtesy. But she rather turned away, also; and she kept her hands behind her. So Nan bade her good-bye in return; and continued on her way along the lonely cliffs.

Some considerable time thereafter, when Nan Beresford was nearing Brighton, she turned and looked behind her; and she could make out, on the summit of one of the rounded undulations towards Rottingdean, the figure of a woman, whom she at once guessed to be Singing Sal. That solitary figure was impressive there--high up on the edge of the slope; the still, s.h.i.+ning sea far below her; and all around her and illumining her, as it were, the reddening glow flooding over from the westering sun. Nan--perhaps moved by some subtle compunction, perhaps only in token of friendly remembrance--took out her handkerchief and waved it twice; but there was no response.

CHAPTER II.

IN BRUNSWICK TERRACE.

That same afternoon all Brighton was astir with curiosity because of a large vessel that had slowly come in from the west before an almost imperceptible breeze. She came unusually, and, as some thought, dangerously close in sh.o.r.e; and no doubt she looked even larger than she really was, for she had every st.i.tch of canvas set, from her royals down to her lower studding sails, that stood out on each side like great bat's wings; while all this ma.s.s of sail was dark in shadow against the western glow. As the spectators watched her, those among them who knew a little about nautical matters guessed that this must be a man-of-war from the rapidity with which she began to furl her sails--letting the golden light s.h.i.+ne along between her spars; while they further concluded, from the fact that only a kedge was thrown out at her bows, that her stay in these shallow waters would be brief.

Now we must see how the advent of this stranger was regarded by the occupants of a certain drawing-room in Brunswick Terrace. These were five--a mother, son, and three daughters; and as they will all appear, more or less, in the following history, it may be as well to introduce them now and categorically to the reader.

First of all came Lady Beresford herself--an elderly, sallow-faced, weak-looking woman, the widow of a General Officer who had got his K.C.B.-s.h.i.+p for long service in India. She had a nervous system that she wors.h.i.+pped as a sort of fetish; and in turn the obliging divinity relieved her from many of the cares and troubles of this wearyful world. For how could she submit to any discomfort or privation (the family were not very well off for their station in life); or how could she receive objectionable visitors, or investigate cases of harrowing distress, or remonstrate with careless livery-stable keepers, or call to account extortionate milliners when this precious nervous system had to be considered? Lady Beresford turned away from these things and ordered round her bath-chair, and was taken out to the end of the Pier, that she might be soothed by the music and the sea air.

The eldest daughter in this drawing-room (the eldest daughter of the family was married and in India) had not much nervousness about her.

She was a handsome, tall, blonde girl of the clear-cut English type, cold and even proud in manner, strict in the performance of all her duties, and not very charitable in her criticism of others. She had a good figure; she dressed well; clear health shone in her pale fair face and bright cold eyes. She was a daring horsewoman. Her brother called her 'Nails,' which was a final contraction for 'Old Hard-as-Nails.'

The next sister, Edith, that same graceless youth was in the habit of calling 'The Sentimental.' She was the darkest of the family, and the most beautiful also, where every one was more or less good-looking.

She had soft brown hair, dark blue-gray eyes of the tenderest expression, and a beseeching innocent look. She was fond of music; played and sang very fairly herself; but she was most admirable as a listener. In a room filled with half-murmuring people, she alone remained mute and devoted; her chair drawn close to the piano; her form motionless. It is true her brother boldly attributed Edith's strict observance of this att.i.tude to the fact that she knew she had a striking profile, and that in no other way could she be so well seen by the room. But then there are some people who will say anything.