The Vicissitudes of Bessie Fairfax Part 14

A white sateen dress embroidered in black and red, and a flapping leghorn hat tied down gypsy style with a crimson ribbon, was a picturesque costume, but not orthodox as a yachting costume at Ryde.

Bessie had a provincial French air in spite of her English face, and Mr.

Cecil Burleigh perhaps regretted that she was not more suitably equipped for making her _debut_ in his company. He had a prejudice against peculiarity in dress, and knew that it was a terrible thing to be out of the fas.h.i.+on and to run the gauntlet of bold eyes on Ryde pier. At the seaside the world is idle, and has nothing to do but stare and speculate. Bessie had beauty enough to be stared at for that alone, but it was not her beauty that attracted most remark; it was her cavalier and the singularity of her attire. Poor child! with her own industrious fingers had she lavishly embroidered that heathen embroidery. The gentlemen were not critically severe; the ladies looked at her, and looked again for her escort's sake, and wondered how this prodigiously fine gentleman came to have foregathered with so outlandish a blus.h.i.+ng girl; for Bessie, when she perceived herself an object of curious observation, blushed furiously under the unmitigated fire of their gaze.

And most heartily did she wish herself back again on board the Foam.

Mr. Cecil Burleigh had friends and acquaintances everywhere, and some very dear friends at this moment at Ryde. That was why he ended his yachting there. As he advanced with Bessie up the pier every minute there was an arrest, a brisk inquiry, and a reply. At last a halt that might have been a _rendezvous_ occurred, finding of seats ensued, with general introductions, and then a settling down on pretence of watching the yachts through a gla.s.s. It was a very pretty spectacle, and Bessie was left at liberty to enjoy it, and also to take note of the many gay and fas.h.i.+onable folk who enrich and embellish Ryde in the season; for Mr. Cecil Burleigh was entirely engrossed with another person. The party they had joined consisted of a very thin old gentleman, spruce, well brushed, and well cared for; of a languid, pale lady, some thirty years younger, who was his wife; and of two girls, their daughters. It was one of these daughters who absorbed all Mr. Cecil Burleigh's attention, and Bessie recognized her at once as that most beautiful young lady to whom he had been devoted at the Fairfield wedding. His meeting with her had quite transfigured him. He looked infinitely glad, an expression that was reflected on her countenance in a lovely light of joy. It was not necessary to be a witch to discern that there was an understanding between these two--that they loved one another. Bessie saw it and felt sympathetic, and was provoked at the recollection of her foolish conceit in being perplexed by the gentleman's elaborate courtesies to herself.

The other sister talked to her. Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner sat in silent pensiveness, according to their wont, contemplating the boats on the water. Mr. Cecil Burleigh and Julia (he called her Julia) conversed together in low but earnest tones. It seemed that they had much to communicate. Presently they crossed the pier, and stood for ever so long leaning over the railing. Bessie was not inquisitive, but she could take a lively, unselfish interest in many matters that did not concern her.

When they turned round again she was somehow not surprised to see that Mr. Cecil Burleigh had a constrained air, and that the sh.e.l.l-pink face of the young lady was pale and distorted with emotion. Their joy and gladness had been but evanescent. She came hastily to her mother and said they would now go home to luncheon. On the way she and Mr. Cecil Burleigh followed behind the rest, but they did not speak much, or spoke only of common things.

The Gardiners had a small house in a street turning up from the Strand, a confined little house of the ordinary lodging-house sort, with a handsbreadth of gravel and shrubs in front, and from the sitting-room window up stairs a side-glance at the sea. From a few words that Mr.

Gardiner dropped, Bessie learned that it was theirs for twelve months, until the following June; that it was very dear, but the cheapest place they could get in Ryde fit to put their heads into; also that Ryde was chosen as their home for a year because it was cheerful for "poor papa."

Here was a family of indigent gentility, servile waiters upon the accidents of Fortune, unable to work, but not ashamed to beg, as their friends and kindred to the fourth degree could have plaintively testified. It was a mystery to common folks how they lived and got along. They were most agreeable and accomplished people, who knew everybody and went everywhere. The daughters had taste and beauty. They visited by turns at great houses, never both leaving their parents at the same time; they wore pretty, even elegant clothing, and were always ready to a.s.sist at amateur concerts, private theatricals, church festivals, and other cheerful celebrations. Miss Julia Gardiner's voice was an acquisition at an evening party; her elder sister's brilliant touch on the piano was worth an invitation to the most select entertainment. And besides this, there are rich, kind people about in the world who are always glad to give poor girls, who are also nice, a little amus.e.m.e.nt. And the Miss Gardiners were popular; they were very sweet-tempered, lady-like, useful, and charming.

Bessie Fairfax was an admirer of beauty in her own s.e.x, and she could scarcely take her eyes from the winsome fair face of Julia. It was a very fair face, very lovely. After luncheon, at Mr. Cecil Burleigh's request, she sang a new song that was lying on the piano; and they talked of old songs which he professed to like better, which she said she had forgotten. Mr. Gardiner had not come up stairs, and Mrs.

Gardiner, who had, soon disappeared. It was a narrow little room made graceful with a few plants and ornaments and the working tools of ladies; novels from the library were on the table and on the couch. A word spoken there could not be spoken in secret. By and by, Helen, the elder sister, proposed to take Bessie to the arcade. Mr. Cecil Burleigh demurred, but acceded when it was added that "mamma" would go with them.

Mamma went, a weary, willing sacrifice; and in the arcade and in somebody's pretty verandah they spent the hot afternoon until six o'clock. When they returned to the house, Mr. Cecil Burleigh and Julia were still together, and the new song on the desk of the piano had not been moved to make room for any other. The gentleman appeared annoyed, the lady weary and dejected. Bessie had no doubt that they were lovers who had roughnesses in the course of their true love, and she sentimentally wished them good-speed over all obstacles.

Mr. Cecil Burleigh rose as they entered, and said he would walk down the pier with Miss Fairfax to restore her to the yacht, and Mr. Gardiner bade Julia put on her hat and walk with them--it would refresh her after staying all the hot afternoon in-doors.

The pier was deserted now. The gay crowd had disappeared, the regatta was over for the day, and the band silent. The glare of suns.h.i.+ne had softened to a delicate amber glow, and the water was smooth, translucent as a lake. The three walked at a pace, but were overtaken and pa.s.sed by two ladies in dark blue-braided serge dresses that cleared the ground as they walked and fitted close to very well made figures. Their hats were black-glazed and low-crowned, with a narrow blue ribbon lettered "Ariel"

in white and gold.

"Look at those ladies," said Mr. Cecil Burleigh, suddenly breaking off his talk with Julia to speak to Bessie; "that is the proper yachting costume. You must have one before you come to Ryde in the Foam again."

Bessie blushed; perhaps he had been ashamed of her. This was a most afflicting, humiliating notion. She was delighted to see the boat from the yacht waiting to take her off. She had imagined her own dress both pretty and becoming--she knew that it had cost her months of patient embroidering. Poor Bessie! she had much to learn yet of the fitness of things, and of things in their right places. Miss Gardiner treated her as very young, and only spoke to her of her school, from which she was newly but fully and for ever emanc.i.p.ated. Incidentally, Bessie learned a bit of news concerning one of her early comrades there. "Ada Hiloe was at Madame Fournier's at Caen. Was it in your time? Did you know her?"

she was asked, and when she said that she did, Mr. Cecil Burleigh added for information that the young lady was going to be married; so he had heard in Paris from Mr. Chiverton. Julia instantly cried out, "Indeed!

to whom?"

"To Mr. Chiverton himself."

"That horrid old man! Oh, can it be true?"

"He is very rich," was the quiet rejoinder, and both lapsed into silence, until they had parted with their young companion.

Mr. Cecil Burleigh carefully enveloped Bessie in a cloak, Miss Gardiner watching them. Then he bade her good-bye, with a reference to the probability of his seeing her again soon at Abbotsmead. It was a gracious good-bye, and effaced her slight discomfiture about her dress.

It even left her under the agreeable impression that he liked her in a friendly way, his abrupt dicta on costume notwithstanding. A certain amount of approbation from without was essential to Bessie's inner peace. As the boat rowed off she waved her hand with rosy benignity to the two looking after her departure. Mr. Cecil Burleigh raised his hat, and they moved away.

CHAPTER XV.

_A LITTLE CHAPTER BY THE WAY._

It must not be dissimulated what very dear friends Mr. Cecil Burleigh and Miss Julia Gardiner were. They had known and loved one another for six years as neither was ever likely to love again. They had been long of convincing that a marriage was impossible between two such poor young people--the one ambitious, the other fond of pleasure. They suited to a nicety in character, in tastes, but they were agreed, at last, that there must be an end to their philandering. No engagement had ever been acknowledged. The young lady's parents had been indulgent to their constant affection so long as there was hope, and it was a fact generally recognized by Miss Julia Gardiner's friends that she cared very much for Mr. Cecil Burleigh, because she had refused two eligible offers--splendid offers for a girl in her position. A third was now open to her, and without being urgent or unkind her mother sincerely wished that she would accept it. Since the morning she had made up her mind to do so.

If the circ.u.mstances of these two had been what Elizabeth Fairfax supposed, they would have spent some blessed hours together before dusk.

They stayed on the pier, and they talked, not of their love--they had said all their say of love--but of Mr. Cecil Burleigh's flattering prospects. When he stated that his expectations of getting a seat in the House of Commons were based on the good-will of the Fairfax family and connections, Julia was silent for several minutes. Then she remarked in a gentle voice that Miss Fairfax was a handsome girl. Mr. Cecil Burleigh acquiesced, and added that she was also amiable and intelligent.

After that they walked home--to the dull little house in the by street, that is. Mr. Cecil Burleigh refused to go in; and when the door closed on Julia's "Good-bye, Cecil, goodbye, dear," he walked swiftly away to his hotel, with the sensations of a man who is honestly miserable, and also who has not dined.

Julia sat by the open window until very late in the hot night, and Helen with her, comforting her.

"No, the years have not been thrown away! If I live to grow old I shall still count them the best years of my life," said she with a pathetic resignation. "I may have been sometimes out of spirits, but much oftener I have been happy; what other joy have I ever had than Cecil's love? I was eighteen when we met at that ball--you remember, Nell! Dear Cecil! I adored him from the first kind word he gave me, and what a thrill I felt to-day when I saw him coming!"

"And he is to come no more?" inquired Helen softly.

"No more as of old. Of course we shall see one another as people do who live in the same world: I am not going into a nunnery. Cecil will be a great man some day, and I shall recollect with pride that for six years he loved only _me_. He did not mention Mr. Brotherton: I think he has heard, but if not, he will hear soon enough from other people. If we were not so awfully poor, Nell, or if poverty were not so dreadful to mamma, I _never_ would marry--_never_ while Cecil is a bachelor."

This was how Julia Gardiner announced that she meant to succ.u.mb to the pressure of circ.u.mstances. Helen kissed her thankfully. She had been very anxious for this consummation. It would be a substantial, permanent benefit to them all if Julia married Mr. Brotherton. He had said that it should be so, and he was a gentleman of good estate, and as generous as he was wealthy, though very middle-aged, a widower with six children, and as a lover not interesting perhaps.

Mr. Cecil Burleigh also sat at an open window, but he was not provided with a confessor, only with a cigar. He had dined, and did not feel so intensely miserable as he felt an hour ago. "Dear little Julia!" He thought of her with caressing tenderness, her pretty looks, her graceful ways, her sweet affection. "There were tears in her dove's eyes when she said 'Good-bye, Cecil, good-bye, dear!'" No other woman would ever have his heart.

They had both good sense, and did not rail at evil fortune. It had done neither any mischief to be absorbed in love of the other through the most pa.s.sionate years of their lives. Mrs. Gardiner had remonstrated often and kindly against their folly, but had put no decisive _veto_ on it, in the hope that they would grow out it. And, in a manner, they had grown out of it. Six years ago, if they had been allowed, they would have married without counting the cost; but those six years had brought them experience of the world, of themselves, and of each other, and they feared the venture. If Mr. Cecil Burleigh had been without ambition, his secretarys.h.i.+p would have maintained them a modest home; but neither had he a mind for the exclusive retired pleasures of the domestic hearth, nor she the wish to forego the delights of society. There was no romance in poverty for Julia Gardiner. It was too familiar; it signified to her s.h.i.+fts, privations, expediencies, rude humiliations, and rebuffs. And that was not the life for Mr. Cecil Burleigh. Their best friends said so, and they acquiesced. From this it followed that the time was come for them to part. Julia was twenty-four. The present opportunity of settling herself by a desirable marriage lost, she might never have another--might wear away youth, beauty, expectation, until no residuum were left her but bitterness and regret. She would have risked it at a word from Cecil, but that word was not spoken. He reasoned with himself that he had no right to speak it. He was not prepared to give all for love, though he keenly regretted what he resigned. He realized frankly that he lost in losing Julia a true, warm sympathizer in his aspirations, and a loving peace in his heart that had been a G.o.d's blessing to him. Oh, if there had been only a little more money between them!

He reflected on many things, but on this most, and as he reflected there came a doubt upon him whether it was well done to sever himself from the dear repose he had enjoyed in loving her--whether there might not be a more far-sighted prudence in marrying her than in letting her go. Men have to ask their wives whether life shall be a success with them or not. And Julia had been so much to him, so encouraging, such a treasure of kindness! Whatever else he might win, without her he would always miss something. His letters to her of six years were a complete history of their course. Was it probable that he would ever be able to write so to the rosy-cheeked little girl on board the Foam? Julia was equal with him, a cultivated woman and a perfect companion.

But what profit was there in going back upon it? They had determined that it must not be. In a few days he was expected at Abbotsmead: Norminster wanted to hear from him. A general election impended, and he had been requested to offer himself as a candidate in the Conservative interest for that ancient city. Mr. Fairfax was already busy in his behalf, and Mr. John Short, the Conservative lawyer, was extremely impatient for his appearance upon the stage of action.

CHAPTER XVI.

_A LOST OPPORTUNITY._

Ryde looked beautiful the next morning from the deck of the Foam. The mainland looked beautiful too, and Bessie, gazing that way, thought how near she was to the Forest, until an irresistible longing to be there overcame her reserve. She asked her uncle if the Foam was going to lie long off Ryde. Why did she inquire? Because she should like to go to Hampton by the boat, and to Beechhurst to see her friends, if only for one single night. Before her humble pet.i.tion was well past her lips the tears were in her eyes, for she saw that it was not going to be granted.

Mr. Frederick Fairfax never risked being put out of his way, or made to wait the convenience of others on his yachting cruises. He simply told Bessie that she could not go, and added no reason why. But almost immediately after he sent her on sh.o.r.e with Mrs. Betts to Morgan's to buy a proper glazed hat and to be measured for a serge dress: that was his way of diverting and consoling her.

Bessie was glad enough to be diverted from the contemplation of her disappointment. It was a very great pain indeed to be so near, and yet so cut off from all she loved. The morning was fresh on the pier, and many people were out inhaling the delicious salt breezes. A clergyman, wielding a slim umbrella and carrying a black bag and an overcoat, came lurching along. Bessie recognized Mr. Askew Wiley, and was so overjoyed to see anybody who came from home that she rushed up to him: "Oh, Mr.

Wiley! how do you do? Are you going back to Beechhurst?" she cried breathless.

"Bessie Fairfax, surely? How you are grown!" said he, and shook hands.

"Yes, Bessie, I am on my way now to catch the boat. If you want to hear about your people, you must turn back with me, for I have not a minute to spare."

Bessie turned back: "Will you please tell them I am on board the Foam, my uncle Frederick's yacht? I cannot get away to see them, and I don't know how long we shall stay here, but if they could come over to see me!" she urged wistfully.

"It sounds like tempting them to a wild-goose chase, Bessie. Yachts that are here to-day are gone to-morrow. By the time they arrive you may have sailed off to Cowes or to Yarmouth. But I will give your message. How came you on board a yacht?"

Bessie got no more information from the rector; he had the same catechising habit as his good wife, and wanted to know her news. She gave it freely, and then they were at the end of the pier, and there was the Hampton boat ringing its bell to start. "Are you going straight home? Will you tell them at once?" Bessie ventured to say again as Mr.

Wiley went down the gangway.

"Yes. I expect to find the carriage waiting for me at Hampton," was the response.

"They might even come by the afternoon boat," cried Bessie as a last word, and the rector said, "Yes."