Trevanion

“ I will not hang for you: so you deal in this country with men that kill others, is it not so? But I tell you, Trevanion—that is a name I do not forget—I tell you that you shall not escape. It is not the time now, but there will come a day when you shall repent of having deceived and robbed the man who trusted you. ”

“ Then a new note came in the musical voice.
“It means everything to the mine just now, Trevanion, that you are just where you are, a man to be trusted.”
The words were spoken with a grace which made them seem like a decoration conferred. The eyes that Trevanion raised met deep blue eyes with a mysterious something in them that conquered him. Fealty was suddenly strong in him, loyalty to the lad through thick and thin. Every fiber of his big burliness thrilled with a proud protectiveness. The child on his arm was holding out his arms to young Carrington. ”

“ Trevanion,” said I, with as much steadiness as I could assume, “you have been most kind to me; and out of my own family there is no man I love and respect more.”
Trevanion.—“Humph! What’s all this? [In an undertone] —Am I going to be taken in?”
Pisistratus.—“Do not think me ungrateful, then, when I say I come to resign my office,—to leave the house where I have been so happy.”
Trevanion.—“Leave the house! Pooh! I have over-tasked you. I will be more merciful in future. You must forgive a political economist; it is the fault of my sect to look upon men as machines.” ”

“ I knew enough of Trevanion to feel that I could not reveal the circumstances under which I had formed that acquaintance, for he was much too practical a man not to have been frightened out of his wits at the idea of submitting so classical a performance to so disreputable a scapegrace. ”

“ Why now, if there were no design of which Miss Trevanion was the object, why so frustrate the provident foresight of her mother, and take advantage of the natural yearning of affection, the quick impulse of youth, to hurry off a girl whose very station forbade her to take such a journey without suitable protection,—against what must be the wish, and what clearly were the instructions, of Lady Ellinor? Alone, worse than alone! Fanny Trevanion was then in the hands of two servants who were the instruments and confidants of an adventurer like Vivian ”

“ I felt myself color as I answered firmly, "It is just to Miss Trevanion to add that the unhappy man owned, in her presence and in shine, that he had never had the slightest encouragement for his attempt,—never one cause to believe that she approved the affection which, I try to think, blinded and maddened himself." ”

“ Miss Trevanion glided from the room.
"Have you a sister?" asked Lady Ellinor.
"No."
"And Trevanion has no son," she said, mournfully. The blood rushed to my cheeks. Oh, young fool again! We were both silent, when the door opened, and Mr. Trevanion entered. "Humph!" said he, smiling as he saw me,—and his smile was charming, though rare. "Humph, young sir, I came to seek for you,—I have been rude, I fear; pardon it. ”

“ He saw himself putting away the old savage indifference and insolent disdain, and struggling for a fresh foothold on life. The malice that had pursued him in Trevanion he had accepted unresistingly, as part of an ordained necessity. But with the unfolding of the new conception and character he had come to realize that, as the most intimate elements of his own destruction had lain within himself, so only to himself could he look for self-retrieval. ”

“ The House of Lords, to that active intellect, was as the retirement of some warrior of old into the cloisters of a convent. The gazette that chronicled the earldom of Ulverstone was the proclamation that Albert Trevanion lived no more for the world of public men. And, indeed, from that date his career vanished out of sight. Trevanion died,—the Earl of Ulverstone made no sign. ”

“ But while on this point repentance seemed genuine, it was not so with regard to his conduct towards Miss Trevanion. His gypsy nurture, his loose associates, his extravagant French romances, his theatrical anode of looking upon love intrigues and stage plots, seemed all to rise between his intelligence and the due sense of the fraud and treachery he had practised. He seemed to feel more shame at the exposure than at the guilt, more despair at the failure of success than gratitude at escape from crime. ”

“ Grundy—that is,'the World'—without injury to any one. We must suppose that that footman of Trevanion's was out of his mind,—it is but a charitable, and your good father would say a philosophical, supposition. All great knavery is madness! The world could not get on if truth and goodness were not the natural tendencies of sane minds. Do you understand?"
"Not quite."
"Why, the footman, being out of his mind, invented this mad story of Trevanion's illness, frightened Lady Ellinor and Miss Trevanion out of their wits with his own chimera, and hurried them both off, one after the other. ”

“ My dear sir, Trevanion is an awful man, a stupendous man, one catches fatigue if one is in the same room with him three minutes! At your age, an age that ought to be so happy," continued Sir Sedley, with a compassion perfectly angelic, "it is sad to see so little enjoyment!" ”

“ Come, I will tell you the one secret of my public life, that which explains all its failure (for, in spite of my position, I have failed) and its regrets,—I want Conviction!"
"Exactly," said my father; "because to every question there are two sides, and you look at them both."
"You have said it," answered Trevanion, smiling also. "For public life a man should be one-sided: he must act with a party; and a party insists that the shield is silver, when, if it will take the trouble to turn the corner, it will see that the reverse of the shield is gold. ”

“ No doubt remained in Trevanion's mind, as in the seclusion of his hut that evening he pondered this singular interview, but that the woman had warned him in all good faith. If her words were not true, she was indeed the falsest of her sex. But there are looks, tones, gestures which neither man nor woman can feign; moments in which all the truth of the being comes to the surface; portions of our lives when a clearer insight is gained in the passing of seconds than can be derived from years of ordinary experience. ”

“ It must be owned that the distress of a man whom he allowed to be deserving, did not appeal to him in vain. But it is astonishing how little he spent in that way; for it was hard indeed to convince Mr. Trevanion that a deserving man ever was in such distress as to want charity.
That Trevanion, nevertheless, did infinitely more real good than Sir Sedley, I believe; but he did it as a mental operation,—by no means as an impulse from the heart. I am sorry to say that the main difference was this,—distress always seemed to accumulate round Sir Sedley, and vanish from the presence of Trevanion. ”

“ I do not know. No doubt a stranger, who has more money than judgment. I am sorry for this; I am indeed; and if there were any chance of getting metal out of the earth I could have transferred your mortgages with the greatest ease. As it is—but there, I won't talk of it. As for my own little bond on the Towers, that may remain till Doomsday so far as I am concerned. It would cut me to the heart to see the old place in the hands of any one but a Trevanion."
"You're a good fellow, Trevenick," said the Squire, "and I'm grateful to you."
"Not at all, not at all, my dear sir. ”

“ Polwhele, the riding-officer, close by on horseback, his face flushed and stern-set with anger.
"You look on and do nothing!" he said indignantly to John Trevanion.
"My dear sir, why should I interfere? Boys must fight, let them fight it out." ”

“ But fast as Trevanion went, one went as fast. This [438] was a young Greek who had ridden from Salona to Missolonghi with one Lambro, primate of Argos. Beneath the beard and Suliote attire he recognized Trevanion, and his brain leaped to fire with the memory of a twin sister and the fearful fate of the sack to which she had once been abandoned. From an ambush below the entrance of Ulysses’ cave, he shot his enemy through the heart. ”

“ As I had never examined my passport from the moment Trevanion handed it to me in Paris, I knew nothing of its contents; therefore, as to what impression it might convey of me, I was totally ignorant. To ask the courier for it now might excite suspicion; so that I was totally at sea how to account for his sudden change in my favour, or in what precise capacity I was travelling beside him. Once, and once only, the thought of treachery occurred to me. Is he about to hand me over to the gens-d’armes? and are we now only retracing our steps towards Nancy? ”

“ Doubledick strolled up the hill next day, and stood with a look of keen enjoyment on his face as a score of miners drilled under Trevanion's direction. At the close of the exercise he accosted Trevanion.
"'Tis a noble sperit, to be sure, Maister John," he said, "but daze me if I think yer new sojers and yer iron shetters will keep out Boney and his thousands and millions. He's a tarrible feller, by all accounts."
"'Tis every man's duty to defend his country so far as he is able," said Trevanion coldly, beginning to move away. ”

“ For several days the Squire scarcely left the house. Then he happened to meet John Trevanion riding along the road. The supplanter swept off his hat with a mocking salutation, but the Squire passed him without a sign of recognition.
A day or two later Sir Bevil Portharvan, owner of an estate some miles distant, rode over to the Towers.
"Ah, Trevanion," he said to the Squire, "how d'ye do? 'Tis only yesterday I heard that your cousin was the purchaser of the bonds I held. It must be a great comfort to you that the property has not gone out of the family." ”

“ Trevanion said abruptly, “Talk, my young friend, talk; I like to hear you talk,—it refreshes me. Nobody has talked naturally to me these last ten years.”
The request was a complete damper to my ingenuous eloquence; I could not have talked naturally now for the life of me.
“I made a mistake, I see,” said my companion, good-humoredly, noticing my embarrassment. “Here we are at the lodge. The coach will be by in five minutes: you can spend that time in hearing the old woman praise the Hogtons and abuse me. And hark you, sir, never care three straws for praise or blame,—leather and prunella! ”

“ The day at last arrived, and restored to something like his former self, Trevanion once more appeared in the mess-room of his regiment. Amid the many sincere and hearty congratulations on his recovered looks, were not a few half-expressed hints that he might not go much out into the world for some little time to come. To these friendly admonitions Trevanion replied by a good-humoured laugh, and a ready assurance that he understood the intended kindness, and felt in no wise disposed to be invalided again. “In fact,” said he, “I have come up here to enjoy life a little, not to risque it ”

“ Trevanion came at last. He had obtained my passport, and engaged a carriage to convey me about eight miles, where I should overtake the diligence—such a mode of travelling being judged more likely to favour my escape, by attracting less attention than posting. It was past ten when I left the Rue St. Honore, having shaken hands with Trevanion for the last time, and charged him with ten thousand soft messages for the “friends” I left behind me. ”

“ Though, as usual, very busy, he accompanied me to the Lamb to see my father and cheer him up. Roland still continued to mend, as the surgeon phrased it; and as we went back to St. James's Square, Trevanion had the consideration to release me from my oar in his galley for the next few days. My mind, relieved from my anxiety for Roland, now turned to my new friend. It had not been without an object that I had questioned the young man as to his knowledge of French. Trevanion had a large correspondence in foreign countries which was carried on in that language ”

“ But I wonder, indeed I do, that John Trevanion has dared to show his face here again."
"Oh, 'tis no wonder," said the Squire bitterly. "No one knew of his crime but three, you and I and John Hammond; only Hammond had proof of it, and he is dead. My worthless cousin learnt of his death, I warrant you; the Devil has quick couriers for such as he; and he comes back, relying on my weakness and your holiness. But I'll speak no more of him; he is gone, and I hope I shall never see him again. There's my boy Dick: what is to become of him? He is seventeen; he ought to be making his way in the world. ”

“ As it was, however, Trevanion, whose mind at that moment was full of a thousand other things, caught at my suggestion, with very little cross- questioning on the subject, and before he left London consigned the manuscript to my charge.
"My friend is poor," said I, timidly.
"Oh! as to that," cried Trevanion, hastily, "if it be a matter of charity, I put my purse in your hands; but don't put my manuscript in his! If it be a matter of business, it is another affair ”

“ However interested I felt in all Trevanion was telling me, I could not help falling into a train of thinking on my first acquaintance with the Callonbys. There are, perhaps, but few things more humiliating than the knowledge that any attention or consideration we have met with, has been paid us in mistake for another ”

“ When he had done cackling, he loosed us, and we crawled down the ladder more dead than alive, and here we are."
"PETHERICK'S HEAD APPEARED THROUGH THE HATCH." "And I lay my life 'twas John Trevanion's plot," cried Mr. Polwhele hotly. "Never has such a scandalous outrage been known in Cornwall before. The Judas came to the door and bade us good-night, and said he was sorry we must go, but duty must be done—the detestable hypocrite."
"There was certainly more art in it than the village folks are capable of," said the Vicar. "By——dear me! ”