Brooke

“ They meant that Caspar Brooke would not do a single thing, would not go a single step out of his way, to conciliate the affections of Lady Alice's daughter. He had never in his life looked more of a Bohemian than he did just then. And Miss Brooke suspected him of wilful perversity.
The lights swam before Lesley's eyes. The vision of a big, brown-bearded man, bigger and broader, it seemed to her, than any man she had ever spoken to before, took away her senses. ”

“ He denied any further love, though hating to tell the lie. But Miss Brooke persisted, entreating, provoking, urging, coaxing, pouting; subtly transforming herself into the child with its lovable moods and movements; enslaving him, rendering him powerless at her will, with this one strange exception—he could be strong enough to withhold from her the episode he was ashamed of.
"Paul, Paul," she said sternly. "Tell the truth. Are you not in love now?" ”

“ Caspar Brooke turned round with a face that had grown strangely pale, walked across the room to Lesley, and dropped the letter in her lap.
"There!" he said. "I have done my uttermost. That is your mother's reply to me."
He strode out of the room, without deigning to answer her cry of surprise and inquiry, and Lesley took up the letter.
It was with a burst of tears that she put it down. "Oh, mother, mother!" she cried to herself, "how can you be so unkind, so unjust, so unforgiving? He is the best man in the world, and yet you have the heart to hurt him." ”

“ This vein of brutality and resolute ugliness that one finds here and there in Brooke's work is not wholly amiss nor unintelligible. Like all young men of quick blood he seized gaily upon the earthy basis of our humanity and found in it food for purging laughter. There was never a young poet worth bread and salt who did not scrawl ribald verses in his day; we may surmise that Brooke's peers at King's would recall many vigorous stanzas that are not included in the volume at hand. The few touches that we have in this vein show a masculine fear on Brooke's part of being merely pretty in his verse. ”

“ But Lady Alice thought that she had already said too much, and she restrained her tongue. It was after a long and pregnant silence that she murmured—
"Lesley, my child, I want you to promise me something."
"Oh, yes, mamma!"
"I feel like one who is sending a lamb forth into the midst of wolves. Not that Mr. Brooke is a wolf—exactly," said Lady Alice, with a forced laugh, "but I mean that you are young and—and—unsophisticated, and that there may be a mixture of people at his house." ”

“ Doesn't she see what an intellect that man has? Can't she understand that his abilities are equal to those of any man in Europe?"
"We all know your admiration for Mr. Brooke, dear," said Ethel, saucily. "You had better go and expound your views to Lesley. Perhaps she and her father would get on better then."
Maurice was silent. He sat and looked aghast at the notion thus presented to him. That Caspar Brooke—his friend, his mentor, almost his hero—should not have been able to live with his wife was bad enough! That his daughter should not admire him seemed to Maurice a sort of profanation! ”

“ And Miss Brooke all taken up with her medicine-fads, and Mr. Brooke only a man, after all, in spite of his goodness; and my lady, her mother, far away and never coming near her—if anybody was friendless and forlorn, it's Miss Lesley. Only me between her and her ruin, maybe! But I'll prevent it," said the woman, rising to her feet with a strange look of exaltation in her sunken eyes: "I'll guard her from Oliver Trent as I couldn't guard my own sister, poor lass! ”

“ Miss Brooke made a curious sound, something like a snort; and Maurice flushed a deep and dusky red; indications which all annoyed Lady Alice, although she did not quite know what they signified. She rose from her chair and took the matter into her own hands; but all without the slightest change in the manner of graceful indifference which had grown natural to her of late years.
"That is the place where Lesley used to go," she said. "She tells me she sings to the people sometimes. I cannot sing, but I can play the piano a little, if that is any good. Sophy is going, is she not? ”

“ At the same time Paul was assuming that the bonneted and cloaked mature-looking lady was no other than Mrs. Brooke herself, and he wondered why she should receive callers when so obviously dressed for going out. Miss Brooke rose to greet him with a pleasant smile of welcome. In a simple dress with wide sleeves that fitted tight round the wrists, her short [43] front hair, evenly divided, falling over her temples in rippling masses, she seemed less phantasmal and fairylike, less remote from this world—a being more humanly sweet and that one might dare to woo. ”

“ Caspar Brooke's attitude stiffened. His features and limbs became suddenly rigid.
"I must confess, Mrs. Trent," he said, "that I am unable to conceive the possibility of disgrace hanging over me or mine."
"That is because you are a man, and therefore blind to what goes on around you," said Mary Trent, with sudden bitterness; "and I am a woman, and can use my eyes and ears. There, I'd better tell you my tale at once, and you can make what you like of it. Miss Lesley——"
"If you have anything to say about Miss Lesley, it had better be said in her hearing," returned Caspar, in hot displeasure. ”

“ All that I do is useless. I may lie and cheat and plot as much as I like, but all my schemes are in vain. I cannot hurt her, as she said: I cannot punish him: I have no power left. No power, no beauty, no will! Am I losing my senses, too, like Francis?" She shuddered at the thought. "Perhaps I am going mad—they have driven me mad, Caspar Brooke and his wife, between them—mad, mad, mad!—Oh, God," she said, with a long shivering sigh, "Oh, God, avert that doom! ”

“ Brooke, sharply. "He's a poor fool, and he knows it. Every man's a fool that does not reverence women. And if women would try to be worthy of that reverence, the world would be better than it is."
He rose as he spoke, with apparent carelessness, but those who knew him best saw that the taunt had stung him. And as he moved, he caught Lesley's eye. He had not known that she was to be there; and by something in her expression—by her heightened color, perhaps, or her startled eye—he saw at once that she had heard the man's rude speech and his reply. ”

“ Now that that poor wretched man is hopelessly insane, we might never have learnt the truth. Is there any way in which I can thank you? any way in which I can give you a reward?"
She looked steadily into his face, and saw that he changed color.
"There is only one way, Lady Alice," he stammered.
"You are not to call me Lady Alice: I like 'Mrs. Brooke' much better. Well?"
"I love your daughter," said Maurice bluntly, "and I believe she would love me if you would let her." ”

“ But it would have been splendid if you could have married Lesley Brooke. We should have been thorns in Lady Alice's side ever afterwards."
"You are one already, aren't you?" asked Oliver. He got up from the table and approached the mantelpiece as if to show that the discussion was ended. "No, my dear Rosalind," he said, "I'm booked. I am going to woo and wed Miss Ethel Kenyon and her twenty thousand pounds. She will be sick of her fad for the stage in twelve months. And then we shall live very comfortably. But I'll tell you what I will do to please you. ”

“ I may be your equal in sense and heart and morals; but of course that goes for nothing with such as you."
"Don't be savage, Mary," said Francis, in a conciliatory tone. "I only want you to improve yourself a little, when you can. You're the best woman in the world—nobody knows it better than I do—and you should not take offense at a trifle. So you like Brooke's daughter, eh?"
"Yes, I like her. But I don't like your brother Oliver."
"I know that. What is he doing at Brooke's house? Let me see—he isn't engaged to that girl? It's the actress he's going to marry, isn't it?" ”

“ Brooke, never again to interpret for the world, by means of the willing clay, just how a great man who died in the eighteen-eighties really looked in the eighteen-seventies, when all there was to go by was a wraithlike, looking-glassy daguerreotype of the eighteen-sixties. ”

“ If you were more of a woman, Miss Brooke, if you had had a wider experience of life and mankind, you would acknowledge that you could not possibly know very much of what your father had done, and you would be glad of the opportunity of learning!"
This was just the speech calculated to make Lesley furiously angry, and it was with great difficulty that she restrained the words that rose impetuously to her lips. She stood motionless and silent, and Maurice mistook her silence for that of stupid obstinacy, when it was the silence of wounded feeling and passionate resentment. ”

“ Caspar Brooke's dingy drawing-room looked cheerful enough that night, filled by a crowd of men and women, and animated by the buzz of constant talk and movement. It was a distinguishing characteristic of his parties that they were composed more of men than of women; and the guests were often men or women who had done something in the world, and were known for some special excellence in their work. Lesley generally enjoyed these gatherings very much. ”

“ Lady Alice opened her gentle eyes with a look of profound astonishment.
"Darling, don't you see? Mr. Brooke was—nobody."
"But if you loved him——"
"No, Lesley, your grandfather would never have heard of such a marriage. He had his own plans for me. My dear, I am not saying a word against your father in saying this. I am only telling you the fact—that he was what is often called a self-made, self-educated man, who could not possibly be styled my equal in the eyes of society. His father had been a small tradesman in Devonshire. ”

“ Lesley flushed hotly as she was shown into the smoky, little den. It was a scene of confusion, such as she had never beheld before. The table was heaped high with papers: books and maps strewed every chair: even the floor was littered with bulky tomes and piles of manuscript. At a knee-hole table Caspar Brooke was sitting, writing hard, as if for dear life, his loose hair falling heavily over his big forehead, his left hand grasping his thick brown beard. He looked up as Lesley entered, and gave her a nod. ”

“ Things will turn out all right by and by. Nobody could be so absurd as to believe ill of your father."
"You think it will be all right?" said Lesley, wistfully.
"Don't ask me to believe in a God in heaven, if things go badly with Caspar," said Miss Brooke, curtly. "Haven't I lived ten years in the house with the man, and don't I know that he would not hurt a fly? ”

“ Keep your own counsel, by all means. But you are placing yourself in a very risky position. Lady Alice Brooke knows something that would, I suppose, compromise you in the world's eyes, if it were generally known. Her daughter is coming to Brooke's house. You mean—you seriously mean—to go to his house and visit this girl? thereby offending her mother (who is sure to hear of the visit) and bringing down the ill-will of all the Courtleroys upon your head? Have you no regard for your character and your position in the world? You are risking both, and you have nothing to gain. ”

“ Brooke, how grateful I feel for all this trouble and—"
"Ah, now, Miss Talbot!" cried Brooke, averting his face, and holding up both hands, "don't—don't! Let's drop all that sort of thing. It's part of the mockery of civilization. Words generally count for nothing. Acts are all in all. What I ask of you is for you to gather up your strength so as to be able to foot it with me and not break down. ”

“ Brooke. "To come out now and then is to make them love their homes, man. They'll put more heart in to their work, if they have a little rest and enjoyment now and then, as you do. Besides—you've got hold of a wrong principle. The women are not your slaves and servants; they ought not to be. They are your companions, your helpers. The more they are in sympathy with you, the better they will help you. Don't keep your wives out of the brighter moments of your lives, else they will forget how to feel with you, and help you when darker moments come!" ”

“ You see I look at it this way, Miss Brooke: all girls have lovers, I say to myself, but a pretty girl like that French maid, is bound to have double the number of lovers than the plain ones. Now, of course, the greater the number of lovers, the greater the chance there is of a criminal being found among them. ”

“ It is impossible that any one with Lesley's faculties should not see her duty, even if she is idle and indifferent enough to let it pass when she does see it."
Mr. Brooke sat down, regardless of the fact that Mrs. Romaine was standing, and looked at the carpet again with a sigh.
"You may be right," he said, in a pained tone; "but if so, what am I to do?"
"You must speak to her," said Rosalind, energetically. "You must tell her not to be idle and obstinate and wayward: you must show her her duty, so that she may have no excuse for neglecting it." ”

“ You know well enough how he was found. I only came to myself when it was done. And then, my wife—with all a woman's ingenuity—bundled me into bed, swore that I had never left it, and that Caspar Brooke had done it. It was a lie—she told me so afterwards. Eh, Mary?—Forgive me, old girl: I've got you into trouble now; but that is better than letting an innocent man swing for what I have done, especially when that man is the husband of one who was so kind to me——"
"And the father of Lesley Brooke," said Maurice, looking steadfastly at Mary Trent. ”