Mr. Lovel

“ Even Sophia Granger, always on the watch for some sign of weariness or shortcoming, could discover no cause for complaint in her stepmother's conduct.
Mr. Lovel came back to Mill Cottage in December, much improved and renovated by the Belgian waters or the gaieties of the bright little pleasure place. The sense of having made an end of his difficulties, and being moored in a safe harbour for the rest of his life, may have done much towards giving him a new lease of existence. Whatever the cause may have been, he was certainly an altered man, and his daughter rejoiced in the change. ”

“ Granger; but it is a faithful one. Mr. Lovel had won a certain reputation for his airy style of art, and was beginning to get better prices for his pictures; but I fancy he has a capacity for spending money, and an inability to save it, which would bring him always to the same level of comparative insolvency. I have known so many men like that; and a man who begins in that way so rarely ends in any other way."
"What am I to do!" exclaimed Clarissa piteously; "what can I do to help him?" ”

“ Heaven grant she may prove reasonable! Most women would be enchanted with such an opportunity, but with a raw school-girl there is no knowing. And that fellow Fairfax's influence may work against us, in spite of her protestations last night."
This was the gist of Mr. Lovel's disjointed musings during the progress of the dinner; but he took care not to neglect Miss Granger even for a moment, and he gave her very little time to listen to her father's conversation with Clarissa. ”

“ If you catch a quinsy, blame that foolish Tony of yours.”
But, though he closed his eyes, he did not sleep. All his life he had been something of a fatalist, and this temper had endeared him to Cromwell, who held that no man travelled so far as he who did not know the road he was going. But while in Oliver's case the belief came from an ever-present sense of a directing God, in him it was more of a pagan philosophy. Mr. Lovel was devout after his fashion, but he had a critical mind and stood a little apart from enthusiasm. ”

“ To these distant Lovels,—to Frederic Lovel who had been brought up with the knowledge that he must be the Earl, and to his uncle and aunt by whom he had been brought up,—the women down at Keswick had been represented as vulgar, odious, and disreputable. We all know how firm can be the faith of a family in such matters. The Lovels were not without fear as to the result of the attempt that was being made. They understood quite as well as did Mr. Flick the glory of the position which would attend upon success, and the wretchedness attendant upon a pauper earldom. ”

“ Her mother was well born and well bred. If you would get at the truth, Miss Lovel, you must teach yourself to believe that they are not swindlers. They are no more swindlers than I am a swindler. I will go further,—though perhaps you, and the young Earl, and Mr. Flick, may think me unfit to be intrusted any longer with this case, after such a declaration,—I believe, though it is with a doubting belief, that the elder lady is the Countess Lovel, and that her daughter is the legitimate child and the heir of the late Earl. ”

“ Rupert and I sail all the same for England and the old property on Saturday.”
CHAPTER VIII.—THE SACRED CUPBOARD.
Mr. Lovel told Gabrielle that the loss of the tankard and the letters were but trifles. His daughter, however, by no means believed him; she noticed the anxious look in his eyes and the little frown which came between his brows.
“Father’s always like that when he’s put out,” she said. “Father’s a man who never yet lost his temper. He’s much too big and too great and too grand to stoop to anything small of that kind, but, all the same, I know he’s put out. ”

“ Lovell.
One morning, about the middle of June, a card was brought in to Mr. Lovell, while he was working in his studio. On it was inscribed a name--Vicomte d'Humières. The card was immediately followed by its owner, a tall, slightly built gentleman; unmistakably a foreigner. He saluted Mr. Lovell with a bow which was undoubtedly Parisian.
"Mr. Gerald Lovell?"
The accent was French, but, for a Frenchman, the English was fair.
"I am Gerald Lovell."
"Ah! That is good! You are a gentleman, Mr. Lovell, whom I particularly wish to see." ”

“ He again mopped his face with the huge red handkerchief, then, with a grunt, strode toward the partly open door, almost colliding with Mr. Lovell, who was about to step outside.
"Captain Slater!" said the lumberman, in surprise.
"It's me, fast enough. I most tumbled over myself a-gittin' here. Lovell—"
"Yes, captain!"
"I wants a word with ye; an' if ye've got a chair as won't break down, I'll plump myself where I kin rest a bit."
"Come in, come in!" responded Mr. Lovell, with a smile; "I'm mighty glad to have you pay me a visit. As neighbors, we don't see each other often enough." ”

“ He will turn you out, neck and crop, as the English say. He will throw you down the stairs, he will heave half a brick at your head, to help you on your way. Then, when you require satisfaction, he will refer you to a magistrate. You will summon him--it will be in the papers--he will be fined half-a-crown! That is how they manage these affairs in England. It is true!"
"But--among gentlemen!"
"Ah, mon ami, voila! In England, nowadays, there are no gentlemen!"
Mr. Lovell moved a step towards M. Berigny.
"I have asked you, as a gentleman, to leave my studio." ”

“ Better than being along with you shtoopid-old-fogish.” And he began to warble wild “Fol-de-rol-lolls” in an insane accompaniment to the music.
“By heavens, this is too bad!” growls Lovel. “Lady Baker, let your big man carry your son to bed. Thank you, Miss Prior!”
At a final yell, which the unlucky young scapegrace gave, Elizabeth stopped, and rose from the piano, looking very pale. She made her curtsey, and was departing when the wretched young captain sprang up, looked at her, and sank back on the sofa with another wild laugh. Bessy fled away scared, and white as a sheet. ”

“ He cried out:
"Body of God, Master Furred Cat, where be's thy gown?"
And the little man span round, spitting and screaming, with his spade raised on high. But his tone changed to fawning and then to a complacence that would have done well between two rogues over a booty.
"Worshipful Knight," he brought out, and his voice was between the creak of a door and the snarl of a dog fox, though his thin knees knocked together for fear. "A man must live, I in my garret as thou in thy castle bower with the pretty, fair dames."
"Ay, a man mun live," the Young Lovell answered. ”

“ He treated the Lord Lovell and his son with such smiling courtesy that they very willingly went with him, before ever their home saw them, on a journey that he was making towards Dunbar, and it was in the battle that some Scots lords made against them on the field of Kenchie's Burn that the Young Lovel did such great things. ”

“ She caught at her basket and she ran to his bridle.
"Come away," she cried out. "Cullerford and Haltwistle have ta'en your bonny Castle. Your father's dead. Your mother's jailed. There is no soul of yours true to you here."
If there was one thing that distinguished the Young Lovell amongst the captains of the North—and his name was very well known to the Scots of the Border—it was that he was quick in thinking. ”

“ Miss Prior has borne poverty so well that I am certain she will bear good fortune, for it is good fortune to become the wife of such a loyal, honest, kindly gentleman as Frederick Lovel.”
After such a speech as that, I think I may say, liberavi animam. Not one word of complaint, you see, not a hint about “Edward,” not a single sarcasm, though I might have launched some terrific shots out of my quiver, and have made Lovel and his bride-elect writhe before me. But what is the need of spoiling sport? Shall I growl out of my sulky manger, because my comrade gets the meat? Eat it, happy dog! ”

“ Though still lost to the outer world, a change passed over Lovel's countenance—again his features relaxed into sleep, and again expressed disquietude. The tramp of horses' feet was around the hut—voices mingled alien sounds with the raging blast;—at last a loud knocking at the door caused the noble at once to start on his feet wide awake. ”

“ They had with them seventeen men, and four women that had served in Castle Lovell, and all were well fed and found, so what they had done in the meantime it was better not to inquire, though they swore that all they had came from the Scots' side of the border. The Young Lovell was well heartened by the sight of all these men, and they rode onward, to the number of sixty-five men and two esquires; twenty-two men having no horses and holding by the stirrups of them that had.
They made a circuit round Alnwick, for the monk Francis doubted the friendship of the Earl of Northumberland. ”

“ When he came to the high uplands where there was some heather, he saw a man with a grey coat with a hood, and as soon as that man was aware of him, he went away with great bounds like a hare, but casting his arms on high as he sprang. The Young Lovell was well accustomed to that stretch of land. It was full of soft, boggy places and he knew therefore that that man had some money in his poke and desired to betake himself where no horse could follow. ”

“ The Lord Lovell of the Castle agreed with him, but said that the women would so have it. He was an immense, gross man, the rolls of fat behind his head, growing black curly hair that ran into his black and curly beard, mantled high up on his neck. His eyes were keen, peeble-blue, sagacious and mocking. The Lady Rohtraut, his wife, a fair, thin woman of forty-three, one of the Dacres of the North, leaned across the Bishop Palatine to disagree with the Warden. Thin as she was she wore an immense gown of red damask worked with leaves, birds and pomegranates. ”

“ So Lovel was moody, was he? something had gone wrong, and according to her shrewd and simple creed nothing could go wrong enough to provoke moodiness in a man who had no crops or beasts of his own to worry about except his dealings with a woman. Had Miss Warrener given him the cold shoulder at last? she wouldn’t wonder, and was maliciously glad that Lovel should have met at last with a match in his own hoity-toity ways. ”

“ And these bondsmen promised that for six months they would supply all that should be needed for the support of such men as the Lord Lovell should see fit to leave in that Castle, the price being left in account between that lord and them, and the men-at-arms to be ready to defend them against raiders if any should come.
So the Young Lovell began to be of better spirits for, with all these preparations for warfare, he had thought less of the lady of the doves. And the monk Francis encouraged him in this, though once or twice he sighed. ”

“ Lovel should ever hope to get Miss Warrener, he, a village boy when all was said and done, with an old bed-ridden witch for a mother and a daft hobgoblin for a brother; but her own feelings for Lovel stepped in to destroy this consolation: wasn’t he a proper strong young man, as difficult to catch as a colt turned loose on the Downs, with his wild dark air, enough to touch the fancy of a girl? ”

“ Lovell thought that that was good--from her. "He is a man who is extremely difficile, Monsieur. I do not think you have a word which expresses what I would say in English. He is extremely jealous; he is enraged that his wife should use the eyes which are in her head! The very day on which we arrived at Spa we had a dreadful quarrel. I will not speak of the treatment to which I was subjected; it is enough to say that he locked the door so that I should not leave the room--he wished to make of me a prisoner. ”

“ Love makes its own sunshine even in a dungeon. Norman, take her hand. Samuel Parris, they are ready."
The old minister, who stood leaning against the wall, came forward silently, took the two hands reached out to him in his firm clasp, and in a few, deep, solemn words, made Elizabeth Parris Norman Lovel's wife. Just as the ceremony was completed a cloud passed over the sun, and its light, filtering dimly through the iron bars which grated the window, shed a weird gloom over the group of persons so strangely brought together. ”

“ So, just as the young moon set, Sir Matthew Grey with all the men-at-arms, all the bowmen and fifty of the rievers, making in all two hundred and fifty men, having with him all the knights and esquires as well as the Young Lovell's most trusted esquire, Cressingham, that knew very well the ways into Castle Lovell—all rode over the whiteness of the river at the ford and were lost beneath the light of the stars. ”

“ To every man that he took with him he would give three pounds English, for there would be little booty; such prisoners as they took he would ransom himself, for he wished to have them at his disposal to spare or to slay as seemed best to him. Such cattle as they took they might keep for themselves, or he would buy them at a fair price, for he understood that there were none left at Castle Lovell, where he would need them when he was the lord settled in that place. ”

“ So that some of the Lovell men had become bedesmen at the monastery at Belford, and many perished miserably about the country in the great storm of the second day of April, whilst some had taken to robbery, which was all that was left them. Those in the Castle had hired men from the false Scots and other ragged companions of the Vesty that was Sir Symonde's brother, and there they all dwelt comfortable, having between them about three hundred men-at-arms and a numerous army of bowmen, but no cannon. They deemed that they could well await any assault of the Young Lovell if he should return. ”