Neighbours on the Green; My Faithful Johnny

Let anybody imagine what was the scene presented in my drawing-room now. Colonel Brentford at the other end, with his back to us all, gazing out at the window: Major Bellinger at one side of the room, and his wife at the other, suddenly deserted by the people they had been respectively talking to, looking across at each other with raised eyebrows and questioning looks. Edith, confused and half-offended, stood before the closed piano, where I had led her; and Mrs. Spencer holding me by the arm in the opposite corner to that occupied by Colonel Brentford, was discoursing close to my ear with excited looks and voluble utterance. And these people were strangers to me, not like familiar friends, who could wait for an explanation. I could only whisper in Mrs. Spencer’s ear, ‘For heaven’s sake, do not let us make a scene now—let us keep everything as quiet as possible now!’

Just then Lady Isabella suddenly rose from her seat, and sat down beside Mrs. Bellinger, and began to talk to her. I could not quite hear how she began, but I made out by instinct, I suppose, what she was saying:

‘I cannot ask Mrs. Mulgrave to introduce me, for I see she is occupied; but I know who you are, and you must let me introduce myself. I am Lady Isabella Morton, and I live here with a great friend of mine. Colonel Brentford and I used to know each other long ago–’

‘Yes,’ said Mrs. Bellinger, drawing her breath quickly; ‘I think I have heard–’

‘He was startled to see me,’ said Lady Isabella. ‘Of course, he did not expect—but we are always meeting people we don’t expect. Your daughter is going to sing. Hush! please hush! I want to hear it,’ she cried, raising her hand with a little sign to the Major, who looked as though he might be going to talk. Every word she said was audible through the room, her voice was so clear and full.

Colonel Brentford turned round slowly. He turned almost as if he were a man upon a pedestal, which some pivot had the power to move. Either it was her voice which attracted him, or he had heard what she said, or perhaps he was recovering from the shock of the first meeting.

It was at this moment that Edith began to sing. I do not know what her feelings were, or if she cared anything about it; but certainly all the rest of the party, with the exception of her father and mother, were excited to such a strange degree, that I felt as if some positive explosion must occur. How is it that fire and air, and all sorts of senseless things, cause explosions, and that human feeling does not? Edith’s girlish, fresh voice, rising out of the midst of all this electrified one. It was a pretty voice singing one of the ordinary foolish songs, which are all alike—a voice without the least passion or even sentiment in it, sweet, fresh, guiltless of any feeling. Lady Isabella leaned back in her chair, and listened with a faint smile upon her face; Colonel Brentford stood undecided between her and the piano, sometimes making a half-movement towards the singer, but turning his eyes the other way; while Mrs. Spencer, on the other side of the room, sat with her hands clasped, and gazed at her friend. The two Bellingers listened as people listen to the singing of their child; a soft little complacent smile was on the mother’s face. When Edith approached a false note, or when she was a little out in her time, Mrs. Bellinger gave a quick glance round to see if anybody noticed it, and blushed, as it were, under her breath. The Major kept time softly with his finger; and we—listened with our hearts thumping in our ears, bewildered by the pleasant little song in its inconceivable calm, and yet glad of the moment’s breathing time.

‘Thank you, my dear,’ said I, when the song was done; and we all said ‘Thanks’ with more or less fervour, while the parents, innocent people, looked on well pleased.

And then I went to Edith at the piano, and asked all about her music, what masters she had had, and a thousand other trifles, not hearing what she answered me. But I did hear something else. I heard Colonel Brentford speak to Lady Isabella, and took in every word. There was nothing remarkable about it; but he spoke low, as if his words meant more than met the ear.

‘I knew you were living here,’ was all he said.

‘Oh, I suppose so,’ said Lady Isabella. She had been quite calm before, but I knew by her voice she was flurried now. And then there followed that little agitated laugh, which in the last few days I had learnt to know. ‘Most people know where everybody lives,’ she added, with an attempt at indifference. ‘I too knew that your regiment was here.’

‘But I did not expect to see you just then,’ he went on. ‘And that rose– Pardon me if I was rude. I was taken altogether by surprise.’

‘That I should ask you for a rose?’ she said, holding it up. ‘It is but a poor little thing, as these late flowers always are. Not much scent, and less colour, but sweet, because it is over—almost a thing of the past.’

‘I was taken altogether by surprise,’ said Colonel Brentford.

He did not make any reply to her. He was not clever, as she was. He repeated his little phrase of confused no-meaning, and his voice trembled. And while he was saying all this, Edith was telling me that she had had a few—only a very few—lessons from Herrmannstadt, but her mamma hoped that if they stayed at Royalborough, she might be able to have some from Dr. Delvey or Miss de la Pluie.

‘If, my dear?’ said I. ‘I thought it was quite settled that you were to stay!’ And then her answer became unintelligible to me; for my ears were intent upon what was going on behind us, and instead of listening to Edith, I heard only Colonel Brentford’s feet shuffling uneasily upon the carpet, and Mrs. Spencer asking Lady Isabella if she did not think it was time to go.

‘But you have not had any tea,’ said I, rushing to the front: though, indeed, I was not at all sure that I wished them to stay.

‘We never take any tea,’ said Mrs. Spencer, unblushingly; though she knew that I knew she was the greatest afternoon tea-drinker in all Dinglefield; ‘and we have to call upon old Mrs. Lloyd, who is quite ill. Did you know she was ill? We must not neglect the sick and the old, you know, even for the pleasantest society. Isabella, my dear!’

Colonel Brentford went after us to the door. He looked at them wistfully, watching their movements, until he saw that Mrs. Spencer had a cloak over her arm. Then he came forward with a certain heavy alacrity.

‘Let me carry it for you,’ he said.

‘Oh, thanks! We are not going far; don’t take the trouble. I would not for the world take you from your friends,’ cried Mrs. Spencer wildly.

‘It is no trouble, if you will let me,’ he said.

He had taken the cloak out of her astonished hand, and Lady Isabella, in the meantime, with a smile on her face, had walked on in advance. Even I, though I felt so much agitated that I could have cried, could not but laugh to see Mrs. Spencer’s look of utter discomfiture as she turned from my door, attended by this man whom she so feared. I stood and watched them as they went away, with a mingled feeling of relief and anxiety and wonder. Thus it was over. Was it over? Could this be a beginning or an end?

When I went back to the Bellingers they were consulting together, and I fear were not quite well pleased. The Major and his daughter drew back as I entered, but I saw it on their faces.

‘I hope you will pardon me,’ I said, ‘for leaving you alone. My friends are gone, and Colonel Brentford has kindly walked with them to carry something. Now I know you must want some tea.’

‘Indeed, mamma is a great deal too tired,’ said Edith, who naturally was most nettled, ‘I am sure we ought to go home.’

‘I think she is over-tired,’ said the Major doubtfully.

He did not want to be dragged away so suddenly; but yet he was a little surprised. Mrs. Bellinger, for her part, did not say anything, but she looked pale, and my heart smote me. And then there appeared a line of anxiety, which I had not noticed before, between her eyes.

‘It is only that she wants some tea,’ said I; and the Stokes coming in at the moment, to my infinite satisfaction, made a diversion, and brought things back to the ordinary channel of talk. And then they challenged the Major and Edith to croquet, for which all the hoops and things were set out on the lawn. Mrs. Bellinger and I began to talk when they went away: and presently Colonel Brentford came back and sat silently by us for five minutes—then went out to the croquet-players. A little silence fell upon us, as the sound of the voices grew merrier outside. It may be thought a stupid game now-a-days, but it is pretty to look at, when one is safe and out of it; and we two ladies sat in the cool room and watched the players, no doubt with grave thoughts enough. Colonel Brentford took Edith in hand at once. He showed her how to play, advised her, followed her, was always by her side. What did it mean? Was he glad that his old love had passed away like a dream, and left him free to indulge in this new one—to throw himself into this younger, brighter existence? Neither of us spoke, and I wondered whether we were both busy with the same thought.

At length Mrs. Bellinger broke the silence.

‘I feel so anxious about our Colonel,’ she said; ‘he is so good and so nice. And your friends came by chance, quite by chance, Mrs. Mulgrave? How strange it is? Do you know that there was once– But of course you know. Oh, I hope this meeting will be for good, and not for harm.’

‘For harm!’ I said, with words that did not quite express my thoughts. ‘They are both staid, sober people, not likely to go back to any youthful nonsense. How could it do harm?’

Mrs. Bellinger shook her head. There was a cloud upon her face.

‘We shall see in time,’ she said, in a melancholy, prophetic way, and sighed again.

To whom could it be that she apprehended harm? Not to Lady Isabella, whom she did not know. Was it to the child then, or to him?

CHAPTER IV

Next day I had a number of visitors. Mrs. Spencer had made it so well known in Dinglefield that nobody was to invite Lady Isabella to meet the new officers, that my unexampled temerity startled the whole neighbourhood. ‘Of course they have met, notwithstanding all our precautions—and fancy, at Mrs. Mulgrave’s! She was almost the only person Mrs. Spencer had not told,’ my neighbours said; for the place is so small, that of course everybody knows what everybody else is doing on the Green. The Stokes were the first to call, and they were full of it.

‘Fancy not telling us that Lady Isabella had been here?’ cried Lottie. ‘You must have known there was something, or you would have told us. And what did you mean by it? Did you think they ought to have another chance; or did you think–? Oh, I do so wish you would tell me what you meant!’

‘Another chance, indeed!’ said Lucy. ‘As if Colonel Brentford—a handsome man, and just a nice age—would look twice at that old thing!’

‘He is a good deal older than the old thing,’ said I; ‘and it is a poor account of both men and women, Lucy, if everything is to give way to mere youth. You yourself will not be seventeen always. You should remember that.’

‘Well, but then I shall be married,’ said Lucy; ‘and I sha’n’t mind if nobody pays me any attention. I shall have my husband and my children of course; but an old maid–’

‘Be quiet, Lucy,’ said her sister angrily. ‘If you girls only knew how to hold your tongues, then you might have a chance; but please tell me, Mrs. Mulgrave—you won’t say you did not mean anything, for of course you knew–?’

‘I don’t intend to say anything about it, my dear; and here is Mrs. Spencer coming, if you would like to make any further inquiries,’ I said. I was quite glad to see her, to get rid of their questionings. Mrs. Spencer was very much flurried and disturbed, out of breath both of mind and body.

‘Oh, my dear Mrs. Mulgrave, what an unfortunate business!’ she said, the moment the girls were gone. ‘I have nobody but myself to blame, for I never told you. I thought as you did not give many parties—and then I know you don’t care much for those dancing sort of men: and how was I to suppose he would be thrown upon your hands like this? It has upset me so,’ she said, turning to me, with her eyes full of tears; ‘I have not slept all night.’

Her distress was a great deal too genuine to be smiled at. ‘I am so sorry,’ I said; ‘but, after all, I do not think it is serious. It did not seem to disturb her much.’

‘Ah, that is because she does not show it,’ said Mrs. Spencer. ‘She is so unselfish. You might stab her to the heart and she would never say a word, if there was any one near who could be made unhappy by it. She would not let me see, for she knows it would make me wretched. And I am quite wretched about her. If this were to bring up old feelings! And you know she nearly died of it—at the time.’

The tears came dropping down on poor Mrs. Spencer’s thin nose. It was too thin, almost sharp in outline, but such tears softened all its asperity away. I could not help thinking of those dreadful French proverbs, which are so remorseless and yet so true; about ‘l’un qui aime, et l’autre qui se laisse aimer;’ about ‘l’un qui baise et l’autre qui tend la joue.’ Is it always so in this world? I could have beaten myself for having interfered at all in the matter. Why should anybody ever interfere? Life is hard enough without any assistance to make it worse.

Lady Isabella herself came in late, when, fortunately, I was alone; and she was in a very different mood. She came in, and gave a curious, humorous glance round the room, and then sat down in the chair by the window, where she had sat the day before, and asked Colonel Brentford for that rose.

‘Is it possible it has been and is over,’ she said, in her mocking way; ‘that great, wonderful event, to which I looked forward so much? It happened just here: and yet the place is exactly the same. How funny it is when one remembers that it has happened, and yet feels one’s self exactly like what one was before–’

‘You are not sorry, then?’ I cried, not knowing what to say.