‘My good Miss Charlecote,’ said the captain, who had looked at her with somewhat of a pitying smile, instead of attending to her last words, ‘do you imagine that you know that boy?’
‘I do not know who else should,’ she answered, quivering between a disposition to tears at the harshness, and to laughter at the assumption of the stranger uncle to see farther than herself into her darling.
‘Ha!’ quoth the sailor, ‘slippery—slippery fellows.’
‘I do not understand you. You do not mean to imply that I have not his perfect confidence, or do you think I have managed him wrongly? If you do, pray tell me at once. I dare say I have.’
‘I couldn’t say so,’ said Captain Charteris. ‘You are an excellent good woman, Miss Charlecote, and the best friend the poor things have had in the world; and you have taught them more good than I could, I’m sure; but I never yet saw a woman who could be up to a boy, any more than she could sail a ship.’
‘Very likely not,’ said Honor, with a lame attempt at a good-humoured laugh; ‘but I should be very glad to know whether you are speaking from general experience of woman and boy, or from individual observation of the case in point.’
The captain made a very odd, incomprehensible little bow; and after a moment’s thought, said, ‘Plainly speaking, then, I don’t think you do get to the bottom of that lad; but there’s no telling, and I never had any turn for those smooth chaps. If a fellow begins by being over-precise in what is of no consequence, ten to one but he ends by being reckless in all the rest.’
This last speech entirely reassured Honor, by proving to her that the captain was entirely actuated by prejudice against his nephew’s gentle and courteous manners and her own religious views. He did not believe in the possibility of the success of such an education, and therefore was of course insensible to Owen’s manifold excellences.
Thenceforth she indignantly avoided the subject, and made no attempt to discover whether the captain’s eye, practised in midshipmen, had made any positive observations on which to found his dissatisfaction. Wounded by his want of gratitude, and still more hurt by his unkind judgment of her beloved pupil, she transferred her consultations to the more deferential uncle, who was entirely contented with his nephew, transported with admiration of her management, and ready to make her a present of him with all his heart. So readily did he accede to all that she said of schools, that the choice was virtually left to her. Eton was rejected as a fitter preparation for the squirearchy than the ministry; Winchester on account of the distaste between Owen and young Fulmort; and her decision was fixed in favour of Westminster, partly for his father’s sake, partly on account of the proximity of St. Wulstan’s—such an infinite advantage, as Mr. Charteris observed.
The sailor declared that he knew nothing of schools, and would take no part in the discussion. There had, in truth, been high words between the brothers, each accusing the other of going the way to ruin their nephew, ending by the captain’s’ exclaiming, ‘Well, I wash my hands of it! I can’t flatter a foolish woman into spoiling poor Lucilla’s son. If I am not to do what I think right by him, I shall get out of sight of it all.’
‘His prospects, Kit; how often I have told you it is our duty to consider his prospects.’
‘Hang his prospects! A handsome heiress under forty! How can you be such an ass, Charles? He ought to be able to make an independent fortune before he could stand in her shoes, if he were ever to do so, which she declares he never will. Yes, you may look knowing if you will, but she is no such fool in some things; and depend upon it she will make a principle of leaving her property in the right channel; and be that as it may, I warn you that you can’t do this lad a worse mischief than by putting any such notion into his head, if it be not there already. There’s not a more deplorable condition in the world than to be always dangling after an estate, never knowing if it is to be your own or not, and most likely to be disappointed at last; and, to do Miss Charlecote justice, she is perfectly aware of that; and it will not be her fault if he have any false expectations! So, if you feed him with them, it will all be your fault; and that’s the last I mean to say about him.’
Captain Charteris was not aware of a colloquy in which Owen had a share.
‘This lucky fellow,’ said the young Life-guardsman, ‘he is as good as an eldest son—famous shooting county—capital, well-timbered estate.’
‘No, Charles,’ said Owen, ‘my cousin Honor always says I am nothing like an eldest son, for there are nearer relations.’
‘Oh ha!’ said Charles, with a wink of superior wisdom, ‘we understand that. She knows how to keep you on your good behaviour. Why, but for cutting you out, I would even make up to her myself—fine-looking, comely woman, and well-preserved—and only the women quarrel with that splendid hair. Never mind, my boy, I don’t mean it. I wouldn’t stand in your light.’
‘As if Honor would have you!’ cried Owen, in fierce scorn. Charles Charteris and his companions, with loud laughter, insisted on the reasons.
‘Because,’ cried the boy, with flashing looks, ‘she would not be ridiculous; and you are—’ He paused, but they held him fast, and insisted on hearing what Charles was.
‘Not a good Churchman,’ he finally pronounced. ‘Yes, you may laugh at me, but Honor shan’t be laughed at.’
Possibly Owen’s views at present were that ‘not to be a good Churchman’ was synonymous with all imaginable evil, and that he had put it in a delicate manner. Whether he heard the last of it for the rest of his visit may be imagined. And, poor boy, though he was strong and spirited enough with his own contemporaries, there was no dealing with the full-fledged soldier. Nor, when conversation turned to what ‘we’ did at Hiltonbury, was it possible always to disclaim standing in the same relation to the Holt as did Charles to Castle Blanch; nay, a certain importance seemed to attach to such an assumption of dignity, of which Owen was not loth to avail himself in his disregarded condition.
PART II
CHAPTER I
We hold our greyhound in our hand, Our falcon on our glove; But where shall we find leash or band For dame that loves to rove?
A June evening shed a slanting light over the greensward of Hiltonbury Holt, and made the western windows glisten like diamonds, as Honora Charlecote slowly walked homewards to her solitary evening meal, alone, except for the nearly blind old pointer who laid his grizzled muzzle upon her knees, gazing wistfully into her face, as seating herself upon the step of the sun-dial, she fondled his smooth, depressed black head.
‘Poor Ponto!’ she said, ‘we are grown old together. Our young ones are all gone.’
Grown old? Less old in proportion than Ponto—still in full vigour of mind and body, but old in disenchantment, and not without the traces of her forty-seven years. The auburn hair was still in rich masses of curl; only on close inspection were silver threads to be detected; the cheek was paler, the brow worn, and the gravely handsome dress was chosen to suit the representative of the Charlecotes, not with regard to lingering youthfulness. The slow movement, subdued tone, and downcast eye, had an air of habitual dejection and patience, as though disappointment had gone deeper, or solitude were telling more on the spirits, than any past blow had done.
She saw the preparations for her tea going on within the window, but ere going indoors, she took out and re-read two letters.
The first was in the irregular decided characters affected by young ladies in the reaction