Dacre

“ We are recreant to our position, intelligence, to our fathers' memories—or we shall be if we do not—"
"Do not what?" asked Geoffrey, as Dacre paused.
"If we do not unite and have another revolution!" answered Dacre, slowly and firmly.
There was a slight sound outside the room, which made Geoffrey raise his eyes and glance toward the window; but Dacre, now aflame with his subject, stood before him and arrested his look.
"Ripon, do you think that the nobles, the gentlemen of England, have lain down like submissive creatures to this atrocious revolt? Do you think nothing has been done?" ”

“ Gaming, and drunkenness, and love, the most productive of all the teeming causes of human sorrow, had in a week sadly disordered the well-regulated household of Castle Dacre, and nothing but the impetuosity of our hero would have saved his host’s establishment from utter perdition. Miss Dacre was, therefore, not less pleased than surprised when the britzska of the Duke of St. James discharged on a fine afternoon, its noble master, attended only by the faithful Luigi, at the terrace of the Castle. ”

“ But Dacre waved his hand. "I cannot talk of that," he said, "'tis the same as ever. She knows how I love her, and her father too; but the phantom of a doubt still crosses her--even her; that I can see, and good Sir Philip answers bluffly as is his wont, that he knows it is false; but yet--but yet! Oh, that accursed 'but yet,' Richard. The plague spot is upon me still. That is enough. The breath of one foul vapour can obscure the sun, and the tongue of one false villain can tarnish the honour of a life." ”

“ It was here that Dacre had that singular library of occult literature, and the fantastic curiosities which served as a hobby for himself, and an amusement for his friends. A wealthy man of refined and eccentric tastes, he had spent much of his life and fortune in gathering together what was said to be a unique private collection of Talmudic, cabalistic, and magical works, many of them of great rarity and value. ”

“ They are to be wedded fully when she sees twenty years; and poor Dacre, as noble and as true a heart as e'er was known, looks sternly forward to that day, as a prisoner does to the hour of execution; for she has taught him too early, and too well, all those secrets of her bosom which a wiser woman would have hidden."
"He does not love her, that is clear," answered his companion, in a graver tone than he had hitherto used. "Did he never love her?"
"No, not with manly love," replied Richard of Woodville. ”

“ Monck was still holding out the letter. "You had better see for yourself," he reiterated. "It is damnably circumstantial."
"I tell you it's an infernal lie!" flung back Dacre furiously. "There is no woman on this earth who has any claim on me—except Stella. Why should I read it? I tell you it's nothing but damned fabrication—a tissue of abominable falsehood!"
"You mean to deny that you have ever been through any form of marriage before?" said Monck slowly.
"Of course I do!" Dacre uttered another angry laugh. "You must be a positive fool to imagine such a thing. ”

“ The notice was signed: "John Dacre, Bart."
"Why, that is Mary's friend," thought Richard Lincoln. And when he met Mary, an hour later, he said, half-jestingly:
"Is your friend, Mr. Dacre, a conspirator?"
"He is only an acquaintance, papa; and I hardly know what a conspirator is. But Mr. Dacre is certainly nothing wrong. You should see his face, papa."
"Oh, yes; those dreamers—"
"Papa!" said Mary, almost angrily, "Mr. Dacre is not a dreamer. He is a leader of men—a natural leader—like you!" ”

“ Dacre attempted no further resistance. He was not the man to waste himself upon a cause that he realized to be hopeless. Moreover, there was about Monck at that moment a force that restrained him, compelled instinctive respect. Though he hated the man for his mastery, he could not despise him. For he knew that what he had done had been done through a rigid sense of honour and that chivalry which goes hand in hand with honour—the chivalry with which no woman would have credited him. ”

“ I sat in silence, overwhelmed at the extraordinary nature of the incident, and at the completeness of the proof with which Dacre had exposed its real meaning. In a vague way I remembered some details of the woman's career, her unbridled debauchery, the cold-blooded and protracted torture of her sick father, the murder of her brothers for motives of petty gain. ”

“ My dear Duke, by all means act on Mr. Dacre's valuable suggestion. As I said before, why not? It would at least be interesting to see if the Duchess does or does not lose her arm--almost as interesting to you as to Mr. Dacre. Those blackmailing, kidnapping scoundrels do use such empty menaces. Besides, you would have the pleasure of seeing me locked up. My imprisonment for life would recompense you even for the loss of her Grace's arm. And five hundred pounds is such a sum to have to pay--merely for a wife! Why not, therefore, act on Mr. Dacre's suggestion? Here comes the constable. ”

“ Dacre, had transformed herself into a nun-like damsel, something between a Sister of Charity and a Quakeress in exterior: perhaps Mr. Dacre read the interior too well; and, notwithstanding the lady's assiduous visits to the poor, and attendance on the charity-schools, and regular loud devotions at church, Mr. Dacre remained obdurate and wedded to celibacy. It might be that he disapproved of the marriage of the clergy, but I think he was at one time vulnerable on that point. ”

“ Dacre turned to the stranger. "You appear to be a pretty sort of a scoundrel."
The stranger gave his shoulders that almost imperceptible shrug.
"Oh, my dear Dacre, I am in want of money! I believe that you sometimes are in want of money, too."
Everybody knows that nobody knows where Ivor Dacre gets his money from, so the allusion must have tickled him immensely.
"You're a cool hand," he said.
"Some men are born that way." ”

“ For the very next afternoon, while she was reading aloud to Mrs Fotheringham, the door opened and the maid-servant announced a visitor—Lady Dacre.
The name struck a chill to Iris’s very heart. She retired modestly to a corner of the room and bent her face over her book. Had Lady Dacre recognised her yesterday? Would she say anything about it if she had? Could anything be more unlucky? She sat and trembled as she turned these things over in her mind, and listened anxiously to the conversation, but at present it did not approach any dangerous subject. ”

“ Dacre shared the general elation, and told the Duke of St. James regularly every day that it was all owing to him. May Dacre was enthusiastic; but her gratitude to him was synonymous with her love for Arundel, and valued accordingly. The Duke, however, felt that he had acted at once magnanimously, generously, and wisely. The consciousness of a noble action is itself ennobling. His spirit expanded with the exciting effects which his conduct had produced ”

“ Dacre saw the tear, and marked the silence, and read neither quite aright; for, with a wounded spot in the heart, the lightest touch will give torture. He sat down with the rest, however; he strove to cast off some of his gloom; he told of his journey with Richard of Woodville; and informed the old knight that his late guest, Hal of Hadnock, was now King of England ”

“ The first family, called Lord Dacres of the South, held the castle of the same name, and are ancestors to the present Lord Dacre. The other family, descended Seat of Lord Dacre. from the same stock, were called Lord Dacres of the North, and were Barons of Gillesland and Graystock. A chieftain of the latter branch was warden of the West Marshes, during the reign of Edward VI. He was a man of a hot and obstinate character, as appears from some particulars of Lord Surrey's letter to Henry VIII., giving an account of his behaviour at the siege and storm of Jedburgh. ”

“ My sweet Lord Dacre is come to pay his duty to my lady and tarry some days here, on his way to Thetford, the Duke of Norfolk's seat, where his grace and the duchess my good mother have removed. He is a beauty, Mistress Constance; and nature has so profusely conferred on him privileges, that when her majesty the queen saw him a short time back on horseback, in the park at Richmond, she called him to her carriage-door and honored him with a kiss, and the motto of the finest boy she ever beheld. ”

“ Lord Dacre, after imitating the spirited bearing of his ancestor in his love affair, exhibited it in an equal degree in a more serious enterprise, when it was attended with equal success. He had a principal command in the English army in the battle of Flodden Field, which was gained on the 9th of September, 1514, over the Scots, who had invaded the kingdom during the absence of Henry VIII. at Tournay. ”

“ The Duke was so excited. But he by no means expected what actually came:
"Ivor, she's been kidnapped!"
Mr. Dacre did what he had never been known to do before within the memory of man--he dropped his eye-glass.
"Datchet!"
"She has! Some scoundrel has decoyed her away, and trapped her. He's already sent me a lock of her hair, and he tells me that if I don't let him have five hundred pounds in gold by half-past five he'll let me have her little finger."
Mr. Dacre did not know what to make of his Grace at all. He was a sober man--it couldn't be that! Mr. Dacre felt really concerned. ”

“ Jack Dacre did not hesitate this time. He said young Davenport was perfect, though he did not know him from Adam; and five minutes afterwards, when Tonio, the factotum, appeared with a flourish of a very dirty serviette and an announcement that breakfast was ready. Jack Dacre felt it was time. He was beginning to inhabit a world where all the men were charming, all the women beautiful. ”

“ Ralph answered her absently, and she rattled on to herself, “Rotha shall keep you, beautiful sedge! How you glisten in the moonlight!” Then the girl broke out with a snatch of an old Border ballad,—
Dacre's gane to the war, Willy, Dacre's gane to the war; Dacre's lord has crossed the ford, And left us for the war.
“Poor father,” she said more soberly, “poor father; but he'll come back home now—come back to our own home again” ”

“ One thing more. A Chicago newspaper gave a list of passengers sailing from Boston in a Red Star liner. In it were the names of Nancy and her father.”
For an appreciable time after Dacre had concluded neither man spoke. Then Power said quietly:
“Thus endeth the second lesson.”
His companion was not one who indulged in platitudes. Some men, kind-hearted and pitying, would have reminded him that he was still young, that life was rich in promise, that time would heal, or, at any rate, sear, the ugliest wounds. But Dacre said none of these things. ”

“ But the most striking demonstrations of her genius were the groups of horses which Lady Dacre modeled from nature, and which, copied and multiplied in plaster casts, have been long familiar to the public, without many of those who know and admire them being aware who was their author. It is hardly possible to see anything more graceful and spirited, truer at once to nature and the finest art, than these compositions, faithful in the minutest details of execution, and highly poetical in their entire conception. Lady Dacre was the finest female rider and driver in England ”

“ The younger Dacre was not one of those minds whose rashness and impetuosity are counterbalanced, or rather compensated, by a generous candour and an amiable remorse. He was headstrong, but he was obstinate: he was ardent, but he was sullen: he was unwary, but he was suspicious. Everyone who opposed him was his enemy: all who combined for his preservation were conspirators. His father, whose feelings he had outraged and never attempted to soothe, was a tyrant ”

“ The battle which decided Dacre's fortune took place on the 20th. At dawn Lord Hunsdon and Sir John Forster came before Naworth Castle, but found it so strongly defended that they determined to march to Carlisle, in order to join the force under Lord Scrope. Dacre followed them for four miles, to the banks of the Chelt, where 'hys footmen,' says Lord Hunsdon, 'gave the prowdest charge upon my shott that ever I saw.' Thereupon Hunsdon charged Dacre's infantry with his cavalry, slew between three and four hundred of the rebels, and took between two and three hundred prisoners. ”

“ Dacre understand that she loved him very much indeed: she was a holy child, and the principal joy of her innocent life was to hear me tell her those stories in which I used to take delight in my early days—how contrasted to hers! She would sing her pretty hymns, seated on a low footstool at Lord Treherne's feet; and the stately nobleman, with tears in his eyes, used to exclaim with pathos,
"Sister Ruth, sister Ruth, my heart misgives me; the angels surely will take this child to themselves, and leave us desolate." ”

“ There was that indefinable tone of conviction in her voice which comes with the constant repetition of any formula of faith.
"I suppose one must," replied Jack Dacre politely, though it was years since he had been of those who recess at Easter. The recollection made him return to his previous occupation of frowning out of the window at a blank wall, though you cannot expect a view, even at Monte Carlo, in a four-lire pension! Not that he would have cared for one, his chief wants in life being a cheap bed and breakfast, and proximity to a gambling-table. ”