Lord Hartledon

“ Lord Hartledon began to recover himself, though he looked foolish still. With these nervous men it is the first plunge that tells; get that over and they are brave as their fellows.
"I cannot marry two women, Lady Kirton, and I am bound to Anne." ”

“ I shall stand up for myself and Maude."
Hartledon made no remonstrance: only drew the boy to him, with a hasty gesture, as though he would shield him from anger and the world.
Anne, hurt almost to tears, quitted the room. But she had scarcely reached her own when she remembered that she had left a diamond brooch in the nursery, which she had just been about to put into her dress when alarmed by the cries. She went back for it, and stood almost confounded by what she saw. Lord Hartledon, sitting down, had clasped his boy in his arms, and was sobbing over him; emotion such as man rarely betrays. ”

“ Mr. Carr stopped, and Lord Hartledon looked round. Lady Hartledon was close behind him.
"Percival, what is the matter?" she asked, turning her back on Mr. Carr, as if ignoring his presence. "What bad news did that parson bring you?—a friend, I presume, of Dr. Ashton's."
They had both risen. Lord Hartledon glanced at Mr. Carr, the perspiration breaking out on his brow. "It—it was not a parson," he said, in his innate adherence to truth.
"I ask you, Lord Hartledon," she resumed, having noted the silent appeal to Mr. Carr. "It requires no third person to step between man and wife. ”

“ Elster?" cried the angry dowager. "What right has he to be at Hartledon, poking his nose into everything that does not concern him?—what right has he, I ask?"
"The right of being Lord Hartledon's brother," carelessly replied Anne.
"It is a right he had best not presume upon," rejoined Lady Kirton. "Brothers are brothers as children; but the tie widens as they grow up and launch out into their different spheres. There's not a man of all Hartledon's guests but has more right to be here than Val Elster." ”

“ Next to my father, we boys reverenced the doctor; he was our tutor, in a measure, when we were staying at Hartledon; at least, tutor to poor George and Val; they used to read with him."
"And you would hint at some alliance between you and this Anne Ashton!" cried the countess-dowager, in a fume; for she thought she saw a fear that the great prize might slip through her fingers. "What sort of an alliance, I should like to ask? Be careful what you say, Hartledon; you may injure the young woman."
"I'll take care I don't injure Anne Ashton," returned Lord Hartledon, enjoying her temper. ”

“ Her dress was of flowing white crêpe, with jet ornaments; and Lord Hartledon, even in the midst of his perplexity, thought how beautiful she was, and what a sad thing it was to lose her. The truth was, his senses had been caught by the girl's beauty although his heart was elsewhere. It is a very common case.
"The fact is, ma'am," he stammered, turning to the dowager in his desperation, "I have been behaving very foolishly of late, and am asking your daughter's pardon. I should have remembered my engagement to Miss Ashton." ”

“ It was a curious letter to write; but men of Lord Hartledon's sensitive temperament in regard to others' feelings often do strange things; things the world at large would stare at in their inability to understand them. The remorse might not have come home to him quite so soon as this, his wedding-day, but for the inopportune appearance of Dr. Ashton in the chapel, speaking those words that told home so forcibly. Such reproach on these vacillating men inflicts a torture that burns into the heart like living fire. ”

“ Will you go to see them?"
"I am tired of sight-seeing, and tired of Paris too," was Lady Hartledon's answer, spoken with apathy.
"Are you?" he returned, with animation, as though not sorry to hear the avowal. "Then we won't stay in Paris any longer. When shall we leave?"
"Are the letters not late this morning?" she asked, allowing the question to pass.
Lord Hartledon glanced at the clock. "Very late: and we are late also. Are you expecting any in particular?"
"I don't know. This chocolate is cold."
"That is easily remedied," said he, rising to ring the bell. "They can bring in some fresh." ”

“ It is not right that you should bring a man here who has deliberately insulted me. Be quiet, Lord Hartledon; he has. What else was it but an insult—his going out of the chapel in the manner he did, when we were before the altar? It was a direct intimation that he did not countenance the marriage. He would have preferred, I suppose, that you should marry your country sweetheart, Anne Ashton. ”

“ You will do well to consider whether you are doing them a kindness or an injury in permitting it. You have deliberately set yourself to frustrate the hopes of Lord Hartledon and my daughter: will a marriage, thus treacherously entered into, bring happiness with it?"
"Oh, you wicked man!" cried the dowager. "You would like to call a curse upon them."
"No," shuddered Dr. Ashton; "if a curse ever attends them, it will not be through any wish of mine. Lord Hartledon, I knew you as a boy; I have loved you as a son ”

“ Lord Hartledon turned his face upon her; and when illumined with a smile, as now, it could be as bright as before care came to it. "I don't think we men attach the importance to names in a general way that you do, Maude. I shall like to have it Edward." ”

“ Lord Hartledon felt persuaded that it arose from resentment at his having refused to allow her to see the stranger. He rose from his seat.
"There's nothing wrong between me and Maude, Lady Kirton. If there were, you must pardon me for saying that I could not suffer any interference in it. But there is not."
"Something's wrong somewhere. I found her just now sobbing and moaning over Eddie, wishing they were both dead, and all the rest of it. If she goes on like this for nothing, she's losing her senses, that's all."
"She'll be all right when she's stronger. Pray don't worry her. ”

“ I left Hartledon the same day, I think, or the next. After all, Floyd, I don't see that it is of any use looking into these painful things: it cannot bring the dead to life again."
"That's, true," said the miller.
He was walking into Calne. Lord Hartledon kept by his side, talking to him. He promised to be as popular a man as his father had been; and that was saying a great deal. When they came opposite the Rectory, Lord Hartledon wished him good day and more strength, in his genial manner, and turned in at the Rectory gates. ”

“ A day or two after we came to England they crossed over, and went straight down to Calne. There—don't say any more."
"The longer you keep away from Hartledon the greater effort it will cost you to go down to it; and—"
"I won't go to Hartledon," he interrupted, in a sort of fury; "neither perhaps would you, in my place."
"Sir," cried Mr. Carr's clerk, bustling in and addressing his master, "you are waited for at the chambers of Serjeant Gale. The consultation is on."
Lord Hartledon rose.
"I will not detain you, Carr; business must be attended to. Will you come and dine with us this evening? ”

“ Well, she convinced him; and from that moment had it all her own way, and carried out her plots and plans according to her own crafty fancy. Lord Hartledon yielded; for the ascendency of Maude was strong upon him. And yet—and yet—whilst he gave all sorts of hard names to Anne Ashton's perfidy, lying down deep in his heart was a suspicion that the news was not true. How he hated himself for his wicked assumption of belief in after-years!
"You will be free as air," said the dowager, joyously. "You and Maude shall get ahead of Miss Ashton and her colonel, and have the laugh at them. ”

“ I told him there was no fear."
"I would not betray any living man, whatever his crime, for the whole world," returned Lord Hartledon; his voice so earnest as to amount to pain. And the surgeon looked at him; but there rose up in his remembrance how he had been avoiding betrayal for years. "Who is he?"
"Willy Gum."
Lord Hartledon turned his head sharply under cover of the surgeon's umbrella, for they were walking along together. A thought crossed him that the words might be a jest.
"Yes, Pike is Willy Gum," continued Mr. Hillary. ”

“ At these times, when one's heart is almost broken with a sudden blow, one is apt to be soft and yielding. What with that feeling upon me, and what with the fright he gave me—"
"What fright did he give you?" interrupted Val.
"Well, my lord, he—he asked me whether his lordship had come fairly by his death."
"How dare you repeat the insinuation?" broke forth Lord Hartledon, with more temper than Hedges had ever seen him display. "The very idea is absurd; it is wicked; it is unpardonable. My brother had not an enemy in the world. Take care not to repeat it again. Do you hear?" ”

“ And now I'll wish you good-night," continued the barrister, rising. "It's a shame to have kept you up; but the letter contains some consolation, and I knew I could not bring it you to-morrow."
The drawing-room was lighted when Lord Hartledon went upstairs; and his wife sat there with a book, as if she meant to remain up all night. She put it down as he entered.
"Are you here still, Maude! I thought you were tired when you came home."
"I felt tired because I met no one I cared for," she answered, in rather fractious tones. "Every one we know is leaving town, or has left." ”

“ Carr was critically examining the painted landscape on his plate; and the turban was enjoying some fruit with perfect unconcern. Lord Hartledon stood an instant ere he resumed his seat.
"Anne," he said in a voice that trembled in spite of its displeased tones, "allow me to beg your pardon, and I do it with shame that this gratuitous insult should have been offered you in your own house. A day or two will, I hope, put matters on their right footing; the poor children, as you see, have been tutored." ”

“ She turned more sick with envy when, at dinner afterwards, to which the Ashtons came, Lord Hartledon devoted himself to them, almost to the neglect of his other guests, lingering much with Anne.
The countess-dowager marked it also, and was furious. Nothing could be urged against them; they were unexceptionable. The doctor, a chatty, straightforward, energetic man, of great intellect and learning, and emphatically a gentleman; his wife attracting by her unobtrusive gentleness ”

“ Gum. "Maybe you've a touch of fever, my lord. Many folk get it at the close of summer."
Lord Hartledon sat on, and drank his tea. He said well that he was always thirsty, though Mrs. Gum's expression was the better one. That timid matron, overcome by the honour accorded her, sat on the edge of her chair, cup in hand.
"I want to ask your husband if he can give me a description of the man who was concerned in that wretched mutiny on board the Morning Star," said Lord Hartledon, somewhat abruptly. "I mean the ringleader, Gordon. Why—What's the matter?" ”

“ You engaged yourself to Maude some weeks ago."
"Well—but—whatever may have passed, engagement or no engagement, I could not legally do it," returned the unhappy young man, too considerate to say the engagement was hers, not his. "You knew I was bound to Anne, Lady Kirton."
"Bound to a fiddlestick!" said the dowager. "Excuse my plainness, Hartledon. When you engaged yourself to the young woman you were poor and a nobody, and the step was perhaps excusable. Lord Hartledon is not bound by the promises of Val Elster. ”

“ Carr seemed to be having no inconsiderable amount of trouble, to judge by the explosions of wrath on the part of the dowager.
She sat down as he told her, her face turned from him, rebellious at having to listen, but curious yet. Lord Hartledon stood by the mantelpiece and shaded his eyes with his hand.
"Send your thoughts into the past, Anne; you may remember that an accident happened to me in Scotland. It was before you and I were engaged, or it would not have happened. Or, let me say, it might not; for young men are reckless, and I was no better than others. ”

“ After his lordship died I couldn't go away without them—carrying with me nothing but the word of a dead man. The orders came this morning, safe enough; but I had the summons served on me then to attend the inquest, and had to stay for it. I'm going away now, my lord, by the first train."
Lord Hartledon was satisfied, and nodded his head. As he turned back he met Dr. Ashton.
"I was looking for you, Lord Hartledon. If you require any assistance or information in the various arrangements that now devolve upon you, I shall be happy to render both. There will be a good deal to do one way or another ”

“ Lord Hartledon shook his head. "How can I leave Maude to battle alone with the exposure, should it come?"
"It is a great deal less likely to come if you are a few thousand miles away."
"I question it. Should Gorton turn up he is just the one to frighten a defenceless woman, and purchase his own silence. No; my place is beside Maude."
"As you please. I have spoken for the last time. By the way, any letters bearing a certain postmark, that come addressed to me during my absence, Taylor has orders to send to you. Fare you well, Hartledon; I wish I could help you to peace." ”

“ Elster," he reiterated, speaking this time with some anger. "I am Lord Hartledon."
He of the loose coat shook his head. He had his hand again on the supposed Mr. Elster's arm, and told him he must go with him.
"You cannot take me; you cannot arrest a peer. This is simply ridiculous," continued Lord Hartledon, almost laughing at the real absurdity of the thing. "Any child in Calne could tell you who I am." ”