Dynevor Terrace (Vol. II)

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'No, thank Heaven,' said Tom, fervently; 'I've kept my honesty, if I
have lost all the rest.'

Little more was needed to bring Madison to a seat on a wooden bench
beside Fitzjocelyn, answering his anxious inquiries. The first
tidings were a shock--Mr. Ponsonby was dead. He had long been
declining, and the last thing Tom had heard from Lima was, that he
was dead; but of the daughter there was no intelligence; Tom had been
too much occupied with his own affairs to know anything of her.
Robson had returned from Guayaquil some weeks previously, and in the
settlement of accounts consequent on Mr. Ponsonby's death, Tom had
demurred giving up all the valuable property at the mines under his
charge, until he should have direct orders from Mr. Dynevor or Miss
Ponsonby. A hot dispute ensued, and Robson became aware that Tom was
informed of his nefarious practices, and had threatened him
violently; but a few hours after he had returned, affecting to have
learnt from the new clerk, Ford, that Madison's peculations required
to be winked at with equal forbearance, and giving him the
alternative of sharing the spoil, or of being denounced to the
authorities. He took a night to consider; and, as Louis started at
hearing of any deliberation, he said, sadly, 'You would not believe
me, my Lord, but I had almost a mind. They would take away my
character, any way; and what advantage was my honesty without that?
And as to hurting my employers, they would only take what I did not;
and such as that is thought nothing of by very many. I'd got no
faith in man nor woman left, and I'd got nothing but suspicion by my
honesty; so why should I not give in to the way of the world, and try
if it would serve me. But then, my Lord, it struck me that if I had
nothing else, I had still my God left.'

Louis grasped his hand.

'Yes, I'm thankful that Miss Ponsonby asked me to read to the Cornish
miners,' said Madison. 'One gets soon heathenish in a heathenish
place; and but for that I don't believe I should ever have stood it
out. But Joseph's words, 'How can I do this great wickedness, and
sin against God,' kept ringing in my ears like a peal of bells, all
night, and by morning I sent in a note to Mr. Robson, to say No to
what he proposed.'

Every other principle would have cracked in such a conflict, and
Louis looked up at Tom with intense admiration, while the young man
spoke on, not conscious that it had been noble, but ashamed of owning
himself to have been brought to a pass where mere integrity had been
an effort.

He had gone back at once to his mines, in some hopes that the threats
might yet prove nothing but blustering; but he had scarcely arrived
there when an Indian muleteer, to whom he had shown some kindness,
brought him intelligence that la justida was in quest of him, but in
difficulties how to get up the mountains. The poor Indians guided
his escape, conducting him down wonderful paths only known to
themselves, hiding him in strange sequestered huts, and finally
guiding him safely to Callao, where he had secretly embarked on board
an American vessel bound for Panama. Louis asked why he had fled,
instead of taking his trial, and confuting Robson; but he smiled, and
said, my Lord knew little of foreign justice; besides, Ford was ready
to bear any witness that Robson might put into his mouth;--and his
face grew dark. Who was this Ford? He could not tell; Mr. Robson
had picked him up a few months back, when there was a want of a
clerk; like loved like, he supposed, but it was no concern of his.
Would it be safe for him to venture back to Peru, under Fitzjocelyn's
protection, and assist him in unmasking the treacherous Robson! To
this he readily agreed, catching at the hope of establishing his
innocence; but declaring that he should then go at once to the
States.--'What, not even go home to see Charlotte? I've got a letter
for you, when I can get at it.'

Tom made no answer, and Fitzjocelyn feared that, in spite of all his
good qualities, his fidelity in love had not equalled his fidelity to
his employers. He could not understand his protege during the few
days of their journey. He was a great acquisition to his comfort,
with his knowledge of the language and people, and his affectionate
deference. At home, where all were courtly, he had been almost rude;
but here, in the land of ill manners, his attentions were so
assiduous that Louis was obliged to beg him to moderate them lest
they should both be ridiculous. He had become a fine-looking young
man, with a foreign air and dress agreeing well with his dark
complexion; and he had acquired much practical ability and
information. Mountains, authority, and a good selection of books had
been excellent educators; he was a very superior and intelligent
person, and, without much polish, had laid aside his peasant
rusticities, and developed some of the best qualities of a gentleman.
But though open and warm-hearted on many points with his early
friend, there was a gloom and moodiness about him, which Louis could
only explain by thinking that his unmerited disgrace preyed on him
more than was quite manly. To this cause, likewise, Louis at first
attributed his never choosing to hear a word about Charlotte; but as
the distaste--nay almost sullenness, evoked by any allusion to her,
became more apparent, Louis began unwillingly to balance his
suspicions between some fresh attachment, or unworthy shame at an
engagement to a maidservant.

The poor little damsel's sweet blushing face and shy courtesy, and
all her long and steady faithfulness, made him feel indignant at such
a suspicion, and he resolved to bring Madison to some explanation;
but he did not find the opportunity till after they had embarked at
the beautiful little islet of Toboga for Callao. On board, he had
time to find in his portmanteau the letter with which she had
entrusted him, and, seeking Madison on deck, gave it to him. He held
it in his hand without opening it; but the sparkle in his dark eye
did not betoken the bashfulness of fondness, and Louis, taking a turn
along the deck to watch him unperceived, saw him raise his hand as if
to throw the poor letter overboard at once. A few long steps, and
Louis was beside him, exclaiming, 'What now, Tom--is that the way you
treat your letters?'

'The little hypocrite! I don't want no more of her false words,'
muttered Tom, returning, in his emotion, to his peasant's emphatic
double negative.

'Hypocrite! Do you know how nobly and generously she has been
helping Mr. and Mrs. Frost through their straits? how faithfully--'

'I know better,' said Tom, hoarsely; 'don't excuse her, my Lord; you
know little of what passes in your own kitchens.'

'Too true, I fear, in many cases,' said Louis; 'but I have seen this
poor child in circumstances that make me feel sure that she is an
admirable creature. What misunderstanding can have arisen?'

'No misunderstanding, my Lord. I saw, as plain as I see you, her
name and her writing in the book that she gave to Ford--her copying
out of his love-poems, my Lord, in the blank pages,--if I had wanted
any proof of what he alleged.'

And he had nearly thrown the letter into the Pacific; but Louis
caught his arm.

'Did you ever read Cymbeline, Tom?'

'Yes, to be sure I have,' growled Tom, in surprise.

'Then remember Iachimo, and spare that letter. What did he tell
you?'

With some difficulty Fitzjocelyn drew from Madison that he had for
some time been surprised at Ford's knowledge of Northwold and the
neighbourhood; but had indulged in no suspicions till about the epoch
of Robson's return from Guayaquil. Chancing to be waiting in his
fellow-clerk's room, he had looked at his books, and, always
attracted by poetry as the rough fellow was, had lighted on a crimson
watered-silk volume, in the first page of which he had, to his
horror, found the name of Charlotte Arnold borne aloft by the two
doves, and in the blank leaves several extremely flowery poems in her
own handwriting.

With ill-suppressed rage he had demanded an explanation, and had been
met with provokingly indifferent inuendoes. The book was the gift of
a young lady with whom Ford had the pleasure to be acquainted; the
little effusions were trifles of his own, inscribed by her own fair
hands. Oh, yes! he knew Miss Arnold very well--very pretty, very
complaisant! Ah! he was afraid there were some broken hearts at
home! Poor little thing! he should never forget how she took leave
of him, after forcing upon him her little savings! He was sorry for
her, too; but a man cannot have compassion on all the pretty girls he
sees.

'And you could be deceived by such shallow coxcombry as this!' said
Louis.

'I tell you there was the book,' returned Tom.

'Well, Tom, if Mr. Ford prove to be the Ford I take him to be, I'll
undertake that you shall see through him, and be heartily ashamed of
yourself. Give me back the letter,--you do not deserve to have it.'

'I don't want it,' said Tom, moodily; 'she has not been as true to me
as I've been to her, and if she isn't what I took her for, I do not
care to hear of her again. I used to look at the mountain-tops, and
think she was as pure as they; and that she should have been making
herself the talk of a fellow like that, and writing so sweet to me
all the time!--No, my Lord, there's no excusing it; and 'twas her
being gone after the rest that made it so bitter hard to me! If she
had been true, I would have gone through fire and water to be an
honest man worthy of her; but when I found how she had deceived me,
it went hard with me to cut myself off from the wild mountain life
that I'd got to love, and my poor niggers, that will hardly have so
kind a master set over them.'

'You have stood the fiery ordeal well,' said Louis; 'and I verily
believe that you will soon find that it was only an ordeal.'

The care of Tom was a wholesome distraction to the suspense that
became almost agony as Louis approached Peru, and beheld the gigantic
summits of the more northern Andes, which sunset revealed shining out
white and fitfully, like the Pilgrim's vision of the Celestial City,
although, owing to their extreme distance, even on a bright noonday,
nothing was visible but clear deep-blue sky. They seemed to make him
realize that the decisive moment was near, when he should tread the
same soil with Mary, and yet, as he stood silently watching those
glorious heights, human hopes and cares seemed to shrink into nothing
before the eternity and Infinite Greatness of which the depth and the
height spoke. Yet He remembereth the hairs of our heads, Who
weigheth the mountains in the balance, and counteth the isles as a
very little thing. Louis took comfort, but nerved himself for
resignation; his prayer was more, that he might bear rightly whatever
might be in store, than that he should succeed. He could hardly have
made the latter petition with that submissiveness and reserve
befitting all entreaty for blessings of this passing world.

CHAPTER XXII.

RATHER SUDDEN.

O! would you hear of a Spanish lady,
How she woo'd an Englishman?
Garments gay, as rich as may be,
Decked with jewels she had on.
Old Ballad.

The white buildings of Callao looked out of the palm gardens, and,
with throbbing heart, Fitzjocelyn was set on shore, leaving Madison
on board until he should hear from him that evening or the next
morning.

Hiring a calesa, he drove at once to Lima, to the house of the late
Mr. Ponsonby. The heavy folding gates admitted him to the archway,
where various negroes were loitering; and as he inquired for the
ladies, one of them raised a curtain, and admitted him into the large
cool twilight hall, so dark that, with eyes dazzled by the full glare
of day, he could hardly discern at the opposite end of the hall,
where a little more light was admitted from one of the teatina
windows, two figures seated at a table covered with ledgers and
papers. As if dreaming, he followed his barefooted guide across the
soft India matting, and heard his Spanish announcement, that, might
it please her Grace, here was a Senor from England.

Both rose; the one a well-dressed man, the other--it was the well-
known action--'Mary!' it was all that he had the power to say; he
was hardly visible, but what tone was ever like that low, distinct,
earnest voice?

Mary clasped her hands together as if in bewilderment.

'Xavier should not--I will speak,' whispered her companion to her,
and beginning, 'Address yourself to me, sir!'

But Mary sprang forward, signing him back with her hand. 'It is my
cousin, Lord Fitzjocelyn!' she said, as if breath and effort would
serve no more, and she laid her hand in that of Louis.

'Mr. Ward?' said Louis, barely able to frame the question, yet
striving for a manner that might leave no thorns behind.

'No; oh, no! Mr. Robson.'

The very sound of the 'No' made his heart bound up again, and his
hand closed fast on that which lay within it, while a bow passed
between him and Robson.

'And you are come?' as if it were too incredible.

'I told you I should,' he answered.

'I will leave you, Miss Ponsonby,' said Robson; 'we will continue our
little business when you are less agreeably engaged.'

He began to gather the papers together, an action which suddenly
recalled Louis to the recollection of Tom's cautions as to prudence
and alertness, and he forced himself to a prompt tone of business.

'I hope to be able to be of use,' he said, turning to Mary. 'Mr.
Dynevor has given me a commission to look into his affairs,' and he
put into Robson's hands the letter written by James, and signed by
Oliver.

'Thank you, Lord Fitzjocelyn, I shall be very happy to give any
explanations you may wish,' said Robson, measuring with his eye his
youthful figure and features, and piling up the books.

'I should prefer having these left with me,' said Louis; 'I have but
little time before me, and if I could look them over to-night, I
should be prepared for you to-morrow.'

'Allow me. You would find it impossible to understand these entries.
There is much to be set in order before they would be ready for the
honour of your lordship's inspection.'

'I particularly wish to have them at once. You give me authority to
act for you, Miss Ponsonby?' he added, looking at her, as she stood
holding by the table, as one half awake.

'Oh! yes, I put the whole into your hands,' she answered,
mechanically, obeying his eye.

'Allow me, my Lord,' said Robson, as Fitzjocelyn laid the firm hand
of detention on the heavy ledgers, and great leathern pocket-book.

'Yes; we had better know exactly what you leave in my charge, Mr.
Robson,' said Louis, beginning to suspect that the clerk fancied that
the weight and number of the books and bundles of bills might satisfy
his unpractised eye, and that the essential was to be found in the
pocket-book, on which he therefore retained a special hold; asking,
as Robson held out his hand for it, 'is this private property?'

'Why, yes; no, it is and it is not,' said Robson, looking at the
lady, as though to judge whether she were attending. 'I only
brought it here that Miss Ponsonby might have before her--always a
satisfaction to a lady, you know, sir--though Miss Ponsonby's
superior talents for business quite enable her to comprehend. But
our affairs are not what I could wish. The Equatorial bubble was
most unfortunate, and that unfortunate young man, who has absconded
after a long course of embezzlement, has carried off much valuable
property. I was laying the case before Miss Ponsonby, and showing
her what amount had been fortunately secured.'

'What is in the pocket-book?' asked Louis of Mary; and, though she
was apparently conscious of nothing around her, he obtained a direct
reply.

'The vouchers for the shares.'

'In the Equatorial. Unlucky speculation--so much waste paper,'
interrupted Robson. 'Your lordship had better let me clear away the
trash, which will only complicate the matter, and distract your
understanding.'

'Thank you; as you say there has been fraud, I should be better
satisfied to be able to tell Mr. Dynevor that the papers have never
been out of my hands. I will call on you early to-morrow.'

Mr. Robson waited to make many inquiries for Mr. Dynevor's health,
and to offer every attention to Lord Fitzjocelyn, to introduce him to
the Consul, to find apartments for him, &c.; but at last he took
leave, and Louis was free to turn to the motionless Mary, who had
done nothing all this time but follow him with her eyes.

All his doubts had returned, and, in the crisis of his fate, he stood
irresolute, daring neither to speak nor ask, lest feelings should be
betrayed which might poison her happiness.

'Is it you?' were her first words, as though slowly awakening.

'It is I, come to be whatever you will let me be,' he answered, as
best he could.

'Oh, Louis!' she said, 'this is too much!' And she hid her face in
her hands.

'Tell me--one word, Mary, and I shall know what to do, and will not
harass nor grieve you.'

'Grieve me! You!' exclaimed Mary, in an inexpressibly incredulous
tone.

'Enough! It is as it was before!' and he drew her into his arms, as
unresistingly as five years ago, and his voice sank with intense
thankfulness, as he said, 'My Mary--my Mary! has He not brought it to
pass?'

The tears came dropping from her eyes, and then she could speak.

'Louis, my dear father withdrew his anger. He gave full consent and
blessing, if you still--'

'Then nothing is wanting--all is peace!' said Louis. 'You know how
you are longed for at home--'

'That you should have come--come all this way! That Lord Ormersfield
should have spared you!' exclaimed Mary, breaking out into happy
little sentences, as her tears relieved her. 'Oh, how far off all my
distress and perplexity seem now! How foolish to have been so
unhappy when there you were close by! But you must see Dona Rosita,'
cried she, recollecting herself, after an interval, 'I must tell
her.'

Mary hurried into another room by a glass door, and Louis heard her
speaking Spanish, and a languid reply; then returning, she beckoned
to him to advance, whispering, 'Don't be surprised, these are the
usual habits. We can talk before her, she never follows English.'

He could at first see no one, but presently was aware of a grass
hammock swung from the richly-carved beams, and in it something
white; then of a large pair of black eyes gazing full at him with a
liquid soft stare. He made his bow, and summoned his best Spanish,
and she made an answer which he understood, by the help of Mary, to
be a welcome; then she smiled and signed with her head towards him
and Mary, and said what Mary only interpreted by colouring, as did
Louis, for such looks and smiles were of all languages. Then it was
explained that only as a relation did she admit his Excellency el
Visconde, before her evening toilette in her duelos was made--Mary
would take care of him. And dismissing them with a graceful bend of
her head, she returned to her doze and her cigarito.

Mary conducted Louis to the cool, shaded, arched doorway, opening
under the rich marble cloister of the court-yard, where a fountain
made a delicious bubbling in the centre. She clapped her hands--a
little negro girl appeared, to whom she gave an order, and presently
two more negroes came in, bringing magnificent oranges and
pomegranates, and iced wine and water, on a silver tray, covered with
a richly-embroidered napkin. He would have felt himself in the
Alhambra, if he could have felt anything but that he was beside Mary.

'Sit down, sit down, you have proved yourself Mary enough already by
waiting on me. I want to look at you, and to hear you. You are not
altered!' he cried joyfully, as he drew her into the full light.
'You have your own eyes, and that's your very smile! only grown
handsomer. That's all!'

She really was. She was a woman to be handsomer at twenty-seven than
at twenty-one; and with the glow of unexpected bliss over her fine
countenance, it did not need a lover's eye to behold her as something
better than beautiful.

And for her! who shall tell the marvel of scarcely-credited joy,
every time she heard the music of his softly-dropped distinct words,
and looked up at the beloved face, perhaps a little less fair, with
rather less of the boyish delicacy of feature, but more noble, more
defined--as soft and sweet as ever, but with all the indecision gone;
all that expression that had at times seemed like weakness. He was
not the mere lad she had loved with a guiding motherly love, but a
man to respect and rely on--ready, collected, dealing with easy
coolness with the person who had domineered over that house for
years. He was all, and more than all, her fondest fancy had framed;
and coming to her aid at the moment of her utmost difficulty, brought
to her by the love which she had not dared to confide in nor
encourage! No wonder that she feared to move, lest she should find
herself awakened from a dream too happy to last.

'But oh, Louis,' said she, as if it were almost a pledge of reality
to recollect a vexation, 'I must tell you first, for it will grieve
you, and we did not take pains enough to keep him out of temptation.
That unhappy runaway clerk--'

'Is safe at Callao,' said Louis, 'and is to help me to release you
from the meshes they have woven round you. Save for the warning he
sent home, I could never have shown cause for coming to you, Mary,
while you would not summon me. That was too bad, you know, since you
had the consent.'

'That was only just at last,' faltered Mary. 'It was so kind of him,
for I had disappointed him so much!'

'What? I know, Mary; his letters kept me in a perpetual fright for
the last year; and not one did you write to poor little Clara to
comfort us.'

'It was not right in me,' said Mary; 'but I thought it might be so
much better for you if you were never put in mind of me. I beg your
pardon, Louis.'

'We should have trusted each other better, if people would have let
us alone,' said Louis. 'In fact, it was trust after all. It always
came back again, if it were scared away for a moment.'

'Till I began to doubt if I were doing what was kind by you,' said
Mary. 'Oh, that was the most distressing time of all; I thought if I
were out of the way, you might begin to be happy, and I tried to
leave off thinking about you.'

'Am I to thank you?'

'I _could_ not,--that is the truth of it,' said Mary. 'I was able to
keep you out of my mind enough, I hope, for it not to be wrong; but
as to putting any one else there--I was forced at last to tell poor
papa so, when he wanted to send for Mr. Ward; and then--he said that
if you had been as constant, he supposed it must be, and he hoped we
should be happy; and he said you had been a pet of my mother, and
that Lord Ormersfield had been a real friend to her. It was so kind
of him, for I know it would have been the greatest relief to his mind
to leave things in Mr. Ward's charge.'

Mary had been so much obliged to be continually mentioning her
father, that, though the loss was still very recent, she was
habituated to speak of him with firmness; and it was an extreme
satisfaction to tell all her sorrows, and all the little softening
incidents, to Louis. Mr. Ponsonby had shown much affection and
gratitude to her during the few closing days of his illness, and had
manifested some tokens of repentance for his past life; but there had
been so much pain and torpor, that there had been little space for
reflection, and the long previous decline had not been accepted as a
warning. Perhaps the intensity of Mary's prayers had been returned
into her bosom, in the strong blindness of filial love; for as she
dwelt fondly on the few signs of better things, the narration fell
mournfully on Louis's ears, as that of an unhopeful deathbed.

An exceeding unwillingness to contemplate death, had prevented Mr.
Ponsonby from making a new will. By one made many years back, he had
left the whole of his property, without exception, to his daughter,
his first wife having been provided for by her marriage settlements,
and now, with characteristic indolence and selfishness, he had
deferred till too late the securing any provision for his Limenian
wife; and only when he found himself dying, had he said to Mary, 'You
will take care to provide for poor Rosita!'

So Mary had found herself heiress to a share in the miserably-
involved affairs of Dynevor and Ponsonby; and as soon as she could
think of the future at all, had formed the design of settling Rosita
in a convent with a pension, and going herself to England.

But Rosita was not easily to be induced to give up her gaieties for a
convent life; and, moreover, there was absolutely such a want of
ready money, that Mary did not see how to get home, though Robson
assured her there was quite enough to live upon as they were at
present. Nor was it possible to dispose of the mines and other
property without Mr. Dynevor's consent, and he might not be in a
state to give it.

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