The Ordeal of Richard Feverel, v6

G >> George Meredith >> The Ordeal of Richard Feverel, v6

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The three were walking on the bridge at Limburg on the Lahn, where the
shadow of a stone bishop is thrown by the moonlight on the water brawling
over slabs of slate. A woman passed them bearing in her arms a baby,
whose mighty size drew their attention.

"What a wopper!" Richard laughed.

"Well, that is a fine fellow," said Austin, "but I don't think he's much
bigger than your boy."

"He'll do for a nineteenth-century Arminius," Richard was saying. Then
he looked at Austin.

"What was that you said?" Lady Judith asked of Austin.

"What have I said that deserves to be repeated?" Austin counterqueried
quite innocently.

"Richard has a son?"

"You didn't know it?"

"His modesty goes very far," said Lady Judith, sweeping the shadow of a
curtsey to Richard's paternity.

Richard's heart throbbed with violence. He looked again in Austin's
face. Austin took it so much as a matter of course that he said nothing
more on the subject.

"Well!" murmured Lady Judith.

When the two men were alone, Richard said in a quick voice: "Austin! you
were in earnest?"

"You didn't know it, Richard?"

"No."

"Why, they all wrote to you. Lucy wrote to you: your father, your aunt.
I believe Adrian wrote too."

"I tore up their letters," said Richard.

"He's a noble fellow, I can tell you. You've nothing to be ashamed of.
He'll soon be coming to ask about you. I made sure you knew."

"No, I never knew." Richard walked away, and then said: "What is he
like?"

"Well, he really is like you, but he has his mother's eyes."

"And she's--"

"Yes. I think the child has kept her well."

"They're both at Raynham?"

"Both."

Hence fantastic vapours! What are ye to this! Where are the dreams of
the hero when he learns he has a child? Nature is taking him to her
bosom. She will speak presently. Every domesticated boor in these hills
can boast the same, yet marvels the hero at none of his visioned
prodigies as he does when he comes to hear of this most common
performance. A father? Richard fixed his eyes as if he were trying to
make out the lineaments of his child.

Telling Austin he would be back in a few minutes, he sallied into the
air, and walked on and on. "A father!" he kept repeating to himself: "a
child!" And though he knew it not, he was striking the keynotes of
Nature. But he did know of a singular harmony that suddenly burst over
his whole being.

The moon was surpassingly bright: the summer air heavy and still. He
left the high road and pierced into the forest. His walk was rapid: the
leaves on the trees brushed his cheeks; the dead leaves heaped in the
dells noised to his feet. Something of a religious joy--a strange sacred
pleasure--was in him. By degrees it wore; he remembered himself: and now
he was possessed by a proportionate anguish. A father! he dared never
see his child. And he had no longer his phantasies to fall upon. He was
utterly bare to his sin. In his troubled mind it seemed to him that
Clare looked down on him--Clare who saw him as he was; and that to her
eyes it would be infamy for him to go and print his kiss upon his child.
Then came stern efforts to command his misery and make the nerves of his
face iron.

By the log of an ancient tree half buried in dead leaves of past summers,
beside a brook, he halted as one who had reached his journey's end.
There he discovered he had a companion in Lady Judith's little dog. He
gave the friendly animal a pat of recognition, and both were silent in
the forest-silence.

It was impossible for Richard to return; his heart was surcharged. He
must advance, and on he footed, the little dog following.

An oppressive slumber hung about the forest-branches. In the dells and
on the heights was the same dead heat. Here where the brook tinkled it
was no cool-lipped sound, but metallic, and without the spirit of water.
Yonder in a space of moonlight on lush grass, the beams were as white
fire to sight and feeling. No haze spread around. The valleys were
clear, defined to the shadows of their verges, the distances sharply
distinct, and with the colours of day but slightly softened. Richard
beheld a roe moving across a slope of sward far out of rifle-mark. The
breathless silence was significant, yet the moon shone in a broad blue
heaven. Tongue out of mouth trotted the little dog after him; crouched
panting when he stopped an instant; rose weariedly when he started
afresh. Now and then a large white night-moth flitted through the dusk
of the forest.

On a barren corner of the wooded highland looking inland stood grey
topless ruins set in nettles and rank grass-blades. Richard mechanically
sat down on the crumbling flints to rest, and listened to the panting of
the dog. Sprinkled at his feet were emerald lights: hundreds of glow-
worms studded the dark dry ground.

He sat and eyed them, thinking not at all. His energies were expended in
action. He sat as a part of the ruins, and the moon turned his shadow
Westward from the South. Overhead, as she declined, long ripples of
silver cloud were imperceptibly stealing toward her. They were the van
of a tempest. He did not observe them or the leaves beginning to
chatter. When he again pursued his course with his face to the Rhine, a
huge mountain appeared to rise sheer over him, and he had it in his mind
to scale it. He got no nearer to the base of it for all his vigorous
outstepping. The ground began to dip; he lost sight of the sky. Then
heavy, thunder-drops streak his cheek, the leaves were singing, the earth
breathed, it was black before him, and behind. All at once the thunder
spoke. The mountain he had marked was bursting over him.

Up startled the whole forest in violet fire. He saw the country at the
foot of the hills to the bounding Rhine gleam, quiver, extinguished.
Then there were pauses; and the lightning seemed as the eye of heaven,
and the thunder as the tongue of heaven, each alternately addressing him;
filling him with awful rapture. Alone there--sole human creature among
the grandeurs and mysteries of storm--he felt the representative of his
kind, and his spirit rose, and marched, and exulted, let it be glory, let
it be ruin! Lower down the lightened abysses of air rolled the wrathful
crash; then white thrusts of light were darted from the sky, and great
curving ferns, seen steadfast in pallor a second, were supernaturally
agitated, and vanished. Then a shrill song roused in the leaves and the
herbage. Prolonged and louder it sounded, as deeper and heavier the
deluge pressed. A mighty force of water satisfied the desire of the
earth. Even in this, drenched as he was by the first outpouring, Richard
had a savage pleasure. Keeping in motion, he was scarcely conscious of
the wet, and the grateful breath of the weeds was refreshing. Suddenly
he stopped short, lifting a curious nostril. He fancied he smelt meadow-
sweet. He had never seen the flower in Rhineland--never thought of it;
and it would hardly be met with in a forest. He was sure he smelt it
fresh in dews. His little companion wagged a miserable wet tail some way
in advance. He went an slowly, thinking indistinctly. After two or
three steps he stooped and stretched out his hand to feel for the flower,
having, he knew not why, a strong wish to verify its growth there.
Groping about, his hand encountered something warm that started at his
touch, and he, with the instinct we have, seized it, and lifted it to
look at it. The creature was very small, evidently quite young.
Richard's eyes, now accustomed to the darkness, were able to discern it
for what it was, a tiny leveret, and ha supposed that the dog had
probably frightened its dam just before he found it. He put the little
thing on one hand in his breast, and stepped out rapidly as before.

The rain was now steady; from every tree a fountain poured. So cool and
easy had his mind become that he was speculating on what kind of shelter
the birds could find, and how the butterflies and moths saved their
coloured wings from washing. Folded close they might hang under a leaf,
he thought. Lovingly he looked into the dripping darkness of the coverts
on each side, as one of their children. He was next musing on a strange
sensation he experienced. It ran up one arm with an indescribable
thrill, but communicated nothing to his heart. It was purely physical,
ceased for a time, and recommenced, till he had it all through his blood,
wonderfully thrilling. He grew aware that the little thing he carried in
his breast was licking his hand there. The small rough tongue going over
and over the palm of his hand produced the strange sensation he felt.
Now that he knew the cause, the marvel ended; but now that he knew the
cause, his heart was touched and made more of it. The gentle scraping
continued without intermission as on he walked. What did it say to him?
Human tongue could not have said so much just then.

A pale grey light on the skirts of the flying tempest displayed the dawn.
Richard was walking hurriedly. The green drenched weeds lay all about in
his path, bent thick, and the forest drooped glimmeringly. Impelled as a
man who feels a revelation mounting obscurely to his brain, Richard was
passing one of those little forest-chapels, hung with votive wreaths,
where the peasant halts to kneel and pray. Cold, still, in the twilight
it stood, rain-drops pattering round it. He looked within, and saw the
Virgin holding her Child. He moved by. But not many steps had he gone
ere his strength went out of him, and he shuddered. What was it? He
asked not. He was in other hands. Vivid as lightning the Spirit of Life
illumined him. He felt in his heart the cry of his child, his darling's
touch. With shut eyes he saw them both. They drew him from the depths;
they led him a blind and tottering man. And as they led him he had a
sense of purification so sweet he shuddered again and again.

When he looked out from his trance on the breathing world, the small
birds hopped and chirped: warm fresh sunlight was over all the hills. He
was on the edge of the forest, entering a plain clothed with ripe corn
under a spacious morning sky.

CHAPTER XLIII

They heard at Raynham that Richard was coming. Lucy had the news first
in a letter from Ripton Thompson, who met him at Bonn. Ripton did not
say that he had employed his vacation holiday on purpose to use his
efforts to induce his dear friend to return to his wife; and finding
Richard already on his way, of course Ripton said nothing to him, but
affected to be travelling for his pleasure like any cockney. Richard
also wrote to her. In case she should have gone to the sea he directed
her to send word to his hotel that he might not lose an hour. His letter
was sedate in tone, very sweet to her. Assisted by the faithful female
Berry, she was conquering an Aphorist.

"Woman's reason is in the milk of her breasts," was one of his rough
notes, due to an observation of Lucy's maternal cares. Let us remember,
therefore, we men who have drunk of it largely there, that she has it.

Mrs. Berry zealously apprised him how early Master Richard's education
had commenced, and the great future historian he must consequently be.
This trait in Lucy was of itself sufficient to win Sir Austin.

"Here my plan with Richard was false," he reflected: "in presuming that
anything save blind fortuity would bring him such a mate as he should
have." He came to add: "And has got!"

He could admit now that instinct had so far beaten science; for as
Richard was coming, as all were to be happy, his wisdom embraced them all
paternally as the author of their happiness. Between him and Lucy a
tender intimacy grew.

"I told you she could talk, sir," said Adrian.

"She thinks!" said the baronet.

The delicate question how she was to treat her uncle, he settled
generously. Farmer Blaize should come up to Raynham when he would: Lucy
must visit him at least three times a week. He had Farmer Blaize and
Mrs. Berry to study, and really excellent Aphorisms sprang from the plain
human bases this natural couple presented.

"It will do us no harm," he thought, "some of the honest blood of the
soil in our veins." And he was content in musing on the parentage of the
little cradled boy. A common sight for those who had the entry to the
library was the baronet cherishing the hand of his daughter-in-law.

So Richard was crossing the sea, and hearts at Raynham were beating
quicker measures as the minutes progressed. That night he would be with
them. Sir Austin gave Lucy a longer, warmer salute when she came down to
breakfast in the morning. Mrs. Berry waxed thrice amorous. "It's your
second bridals, ye sweet livin' widow!" she said. "Thanks be the Lord!
it's the same man too! and a baby over the bed-post," she appended
seriously.

"Strange," Berry declared it to be, "strange I feel none o' this to my
Berry now. All my feelin's o' love seem t'ave gone into you two sweet
chicks."

In fact, the faithless male Berry complained of being treated badly, and
affected a superb jealousy of the baby; but the good dame told him that
if he suffered at all he suffered his due. Berry's position was
decidedly uncomfortable. It could not be concealed from the lower
household that he had a wife in the establishment, and for the
complications this gave rise to, his wife would not legitimately console
him. Lucy did intercede, but Mrs. Berry, was obdurate. She averred she
would not give up the child till he was weaned. "Then, perhaps," she
said prospectively. "You see I ain't so soft as you thought for."

"You're a very unkind, vindictive old woman," said Lucy.

"Belike I am," Mrs. Berry was proud to agree. We like a new character,
now and then. Berry had delayed too long.

Were it not notorious that the straightlaced prudish dare not listen to,
the natural chaste, certain things Mrs. Berry thought it advisable to
impart to the young wife with regard to Berry's infidelity, and the
charity women should have toward sinful men, might here be reproduced.
Enough that she thought proper to broach the matter, and cite her own
Christian sentiments, now that she was indifferent in some degree.

Oily calm is on the sea. At Raynham they look up at the sky and
speculate that Richard is approaching fairly speeded. He comes to throw
himself on his darling's mercy. Lucy irradiated over forest and sea,
tempest and peace--to her the hero comes humbly. Great is that day when
we see our folly! Ripton and he were the friends of old. Richard
encouraged him to talk of the two he could be eloquent on, and Ripton,
whose secret vanity was in his powers of speech, never tired of
enumerating Lucy's virtues, and the peculiar attributes of the baby.

"She did not say a word against me, Rip?"

"Against you, Richard! The moment she knew she was to be a mother, she
thought of nothing but her duty to the child. She's one who can't think
of herself."

"You've seen her at Raynham, Rip?"

"Yes, once. They asked me down. And your father's so fond of her--I'm
sure he thinks no woman like her, and he's right. She is so lovely, and
so good."

Richard was too full of blame of himself to blame his father: too British
to expose his emotions. Ripton divined how deep and changed they were by
his manner. He had cast aside the hero, and however Ripton had obeyed
him and looked up to him in the heroic time, he loved him tenfold now.
He told his friend how much Lucy's mere womanly sweetness and excellence
had done for him, and Richard contrasted his own profitless extravagance
with the patient beauty of his dear home angel. He was not one to take
her on the easy terms that offered. There was that to do which made his
cheek burn as he thought of it, but he was going to do it, even though it
lost her to him. Just to see her and kneel to her was joy sufficient to
sustain him, and warm his blood in the prospect. They marked the white
cliffs growing over the water. Nearer, the sun made them lustrous.
Houses and people seemed to welcome the wild youth to common sense,
simplicity, and home.

They were in town by mid-day. Richard had a momentary idea of not
driving to his hotel for letters. After a short debate he determined to
go there. The porter said he had two letters for Mr. Richard Feverel--
one had been waiting some time. He went to the box and fetched them.
The first Richard opened was from Lucy, and as he read it, Ripton
observed the colour deepen on his face, while a quivering smile played
about his mouth. He opened the other indifferently. It began without
any form of address. Richard's forehead darkened at the signature. This
letter was in a sloping feminine hand, and flourished with light strokes
all over, like a field of the bearded barley. Thus it ran:

"I know you are in a rage with me because I would not consent to ruin
you, you foolish fellow. What do you call it? Going to that unpleasant
place together. Thank you, my milliner is not ready yet, and I want to
make a good appearance when I do go. I suppose I shall have to some day.
Your health, Sir Richard. Now let me speak to you seriously. Go home to
your wife at once. But I know the sort of fellow you are, and I must be
plain with you. Did I ever say I loved you? You may hate me as much as
you please, but I will save you from being a fool.

"Now listen to me. You know my relations with Mount. That beast Brayder
offered to pay all my debts and set me afloat, if I would keep you in
town. I declare on my honour I had no idea why, and I did not agree to
it. But you were such a handsome fellow--I noticed you in the park
before I heard a word of you. But then you fought shy--you were just as
tempting as a girl. You stung me. Do you know what that is? I would
make you care for me, and we know how it ended, without any intention of
mine, I swear. I'd have cut off my hand rather than do you any harm,
upon my honour. Circumstances! Then I saw it was all up between us.
Brayder came and began to chaff about you. I dealt the animal a stroke
on the face with my riding-whip--I shut him up pretty quick. Do you
think I would let a man speak about you?--I was going to swear. You see
I remember Dick's lessons. O my God! I do feel unhappy.--Brayder
offered me money. Go and think I took it, if you like. What do I care
what anybody thinks! Something that black-guard said made me suspicious.
I went down to the Isle of Wight where Mount was, and your wife was just
gone with an old lady who came and took her away. I should so have liked
to see her. You said, you remember, she would take me as a sister, and
treat me--I laughed at it then. My God! how I could cry now, if water
did any good to a devil, as you politely call poor me. I called at your
house and saw your man-servant, who said Mount had just been there. In a
minute it struck me. I was sure Mount was after a woman, but it never
struck me that woman was your wife. Then I saw why they wanted me to
keep you away. I went to Brayder. You know how I hate him. I made love
to the man to get it out of him. Richard! my word of honour, they have
planned to carry her off, if Mount finds he cannot seduce her. Talk of
devils! He's one; but he is not so bad as Brayder. I cannot forgive a
mean dog his villany.

"Now after this, I am quite sure you are too much of a man to stop away
from her another moment. I have no more to say. I suppose we shall not
see each other again, so good-bye, Dick! I fancy I hear you cursing me.
Why can't you feel like other men on the subject? But if you were like
the rest of them I should not have cared for you a farthing. I have not
worn lilac since I saw you last. I'll be buried in your colour, Dick.
That will not offend you--will it?

"You are not going to believe I took the money? If I thought you thought
that--it makes me feel like a devil only to fancy you think it.

"The first time you meet Brayder, cane him publicly.

"Adieu! Say it's because you don't like his face. I suppose devils must
not say Adieu. Here's plain old good-bye, then, between you and me.
Good-bye, dear Dick! You won't think that of me?

"May I eat dry bread to the day of my death if I took or ever will touch
a scrap of their money. BELLA."

Richard folded up the letter silently.

"Jump into the cab," he said to Ripton.

"Anything the matter, Richard?"

"No."

The driver received directions. Richard sat without speaking. His friend
knew that face. He asked whether there was bad news in the letter. For
answer, he had the lie circumstancial. He ventured to remark that they
were going the wrong way.

"It'd the right way," cried Richard, and his jaws were hard and square,
and his eyes looked heavy and full.

Ripton said no more, but thought.

The cabman pulled up at a Club. A gentleman, in whom Ripton recognized
the Hon. Peter Brayder, was just then swinging a leg over his horse, with
one foot in the stirrup. Hearing his name called, the Hon. Peter turned
about, and stretched an affable hand.

"Is Mountfalcon in town?" said Richard taking the horse's reins instead
of the gentlemanly hand. His voice and aspect were quite friendly.

"Mount?" Brayder replied, curiously watching the action; "yes. He's off
this evening."

"He is in town?" Richard released his horse. "I want to see him. Where
is he?"

The young man looked pleasant: that which might have aroused Brayder's
suspicions was an old affair in parasitical register by this time. "Want
to see him? What about?" he said carelessly, and gave the address.

"By the way," he sang out, "we thought of putting your name down,
Feverel." He indicated the lofty structure. "What do you say?"

Richard nodded back at him, crying, "Hurry." Brayder returned the nod,
and those who promenaded the district soon beheld his body in elegant
motion to the stepping of his well-earned horse.

"What do you want to see Lord Mountfalcon for, Richard?" said Ripton.

"I just want to see him," Richard replied.

Ripton was left in the cab at the door of my lord's residence. He had to
wait there a space of about ten minutes, when Richard returned with a
clearer visage, though somewhat heated. He stood outside the cab, and
Ripton was conscious of being examined by those strong grey eyes. As
clear as speech he understood them to say to him, "You won't do," but
which of the many things on earth he would not do for he was at a loss to
think.

"Go down to Raynham, Ripton. Say I shall be there tonight certainly.
Don't bother me with questions. Drive off at once. Or wait. Get another
cab. I'll take this."

Ripton was ejected, and found himself standing alone in the street. As
he was on the point of rushing after the galloping cab-horse to get a
word of elucidation, he heard some one speak behind him.

"You are Feverel's friend?"

Ripton had an eye for lords. An ambrosial footman, standing at the open
door of Lord Mountfalcon's house, and a gentleman standing on the
doorstep, told him that he was addressed by that nobleman. He was
requested to step into the house. When they were alone, Lord
Mountfalcon, slightly ruffled, said: "Feverel has insulted me grossly. I
must meet him, of course. It's a piece of infernal folly!--I suppose he
is not quite mad?"

Ripton's only definite answer was, a gasping iteration of "My lord."

My lord resumed: "I am perfectly guiltless of offending him, as far as I
know. In fact, I had a friendship for him. Is he liable to fits of this
sort of thing?"

Not yet at conversation-point, Ripton stammered: "Fits, my lord?"

"Ah!" went the other, eying Ripton in lordly cognizant style. "You know
nothing of this business, perhaps?"

Ripton said he did not.

"Have you any influence with him?"

"Not much, my lord. Only now and then--a little."

"You are not in the Army?"

The question was quite unnecessary. Ripton confessed to the law, and my
lord did not look surprised.

"I will not detain you," he said, distantly bowing.

Ripton gave him a commoner's obeisance; but getting to the door, the
sense of the matter enlightened him.

"It's a duel, my lord?"

"No help for it, if his friends don't shut him up in Bedlam between this
and to-morrow morning."

Of all horrible things a duel was the worst in Ripton's imagination. He
stood holding the handle of the door, revolving this last chapter of
calamity suddenly opened where happiness had promised.

"A duel! but he won't, my lord,--he mustn't fight, my lord."

"He must come on the ground," said my lord, positively.

Ripton ejaculated unintelligible stuff. Finally Lord Mountfalcon said:
"I went out of my way, sir, in speaking to you. I saw you from the
window. Your friend is mad. Deuced methodical, I admit, but mad. I
have particular reasons to wish not to injure the young man, and if an
apology is to be got out of him when we're on the ground, I'll take it,
and we'll stop the damned scandal, if possible. You understand? I'm the
insulted party, and I shall only require of him to use formal words of
excuse to come to an amicable settlement. Let him just say he regrets
it.
Now, sir," the nobleman spoke with considerable earnestness,
"should anything happen--I have the honour to be known to Mrs. Feverel--
and I beg you will tell her. I very particularly desire you to let her
know that I was not to blame."

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