CHAPTER VI
Lieben Freunde! Es gab schön're Zeiten
Als die unsern—das ist nicht zu streiten!
Und ein edler Volk hat einst gelebt.
Könnte die Geschichte davon schweigen
Tausend Steine würden redend zeugen
Die man aus dem Schooss der Erde gräbt.
Doch es ist dahin, es ist verschwunden,
Dieses hochbegünstigste Geschlecht;
Wir, wir leben! Unser sind die Stunden,
Und der Lebende hat Recht.
SCHILLER.
"And so you wish you were a pirate, Miss Fitzpatrick," said Mr. Haveloc, as they stood on the deck of his yacht. "I commend your taste. These pirates were pretty fellows in rhyme."
"It would be rather late in the day to commence Viking, would it not?" said Mrs. Fitzpatrick.
"Oh no!" said Mr. Haveloc; "my yacht is quite at Miss Fitzpatrick's service. I do not despair of her making prize of some solitary fishing boat on a dark night. And only think, Miss Fitzpatrick, how excellent the herrings would taste, that you had come by in so meritorious a way."
"I wished to be descended from a pirate," said Aveline, "don't you perceive the amazing difference?"
"Oh, very great! You wish for all their propensities, without the power to put them in practice."
"After all, there were fine things done by those Vikinger," said Aveline. "They had courage."
"Oh, courage! that is born with a man; if he has it not, it is a deformity, not a vice. Just as if he were born without a nose."
"You would respect courage more, Mr. Haveloc," said Aveline, "if you knew what fear was."
"I never had such a compliment paid me before," said Mr. Haveloc, laughing.
"We have a right to pay you compliments, you know," said Mrs. Fitzpatrick, who was seated a little apart, with a book in her hand. "But you do not stand up for the water thieves, or land thieves either."
"He pretends to have no enthusiasm," said Aveline, smiling.
"On the contrary," said Mr. Haveloc, "I admit that time mellows the proceedings of such gentry; and I own to an enthusiastic desire to see them treated as they deserve."
"I was very glad, Miss Fitzpatrick, when our Calabrian friends were duly sent to the galleys."
"You could not have a prettier name for your yacht, 'the Ariel,'" said Aveline. "I am sure it is a beautiful craft, though I am no judge of such things."
"The Ariel was christened before I had her," said Mr. Haveloc. "If I meant to keep her, I should take the liberty to change her name."
"And what would you call her?" asked Aveline, with some curiosity.
Mr. Haveloc, hesitated a little, and then said, "the Pearl."
"And I am very fond of pearls," said Aveline. "How many things there are, Mr. Haveloc, the very names of which recalls much that is beautiful in poetry to one's memory. The Pearl, the violet, the lark."
"True enough," said Mr. Haveloc, "a robin is a prettier bird, but he has not been so much be-rhymed. A pistol is a handier weapon than a sword, but it would make a sorry figure in a lyric."
"And a grand pianoforte," said Aveline, laughing, "will never be appreciated with tears and moonlight, like a lute."
"And a rascally pirate will be hung in chains, to the great delight of all sober people, while a horse Viking, or even a Spanish buccaneer, would be exalted in ballad, or blank verse."
"Allow," said Aveline, "that people cannot live well, who live only in the present time."
"And that people cannot live wisely, who live in the past or the future," said Mr. Haveloc.
"I do not know whether it is too serious an allusion," said Aveline; "but I cannot help recollecting that 'the children of this world are wiser in their generation, than the children of light.'"
Mr. Haveloc remained silent for some moments. "I wonder what that means exactly," said he, at last.
"It means, I think, to give some little comfort to the upright, when they find that all through their lives they are wronged and surpassed by those who are unscrupulous in their tools and weapons," said Mrs. Fitzpatrick.
"Cold comfort," said Mr. Haveloc, still musing.
"I think not so," replied Mrs. Fitzpatrick. "I think it is comfort enough if an honest man is told, on the highest authority—it will be so—you will not surpass—you will not be enriched—you will not be well spoken of, like your unprincipled neighbour—you will be deceived and impoverished by those who are more skilful than yourself, skilful in arts which your profession forbids you to use. If they are not told this, they might become restless and dissatisfied, and attribute to themselves some of the failure which belongs to the fact, that this world is the home of the wicked, but a strange land to the Christian pilgrim."
Mr. Haveloc, seemed much struck by her remarks, but remained silent.
"Mr. Lindsay, is an illustration of mamma's idea," said Aveline, "he is much too honest ever to be rich. Plain dealing never answers with common minds; and I leave you to judge of the proportion of superior people that fall in the way of a country practitioner."
"You think with the old poet," said Mr. Haveloc.
"The stars are not more distant from the earth,
Than profit is from honesty!"
"That is very well said," remarked Mrs. Fitzpatrick, "whose is it?"
"Beaumont and Fletcher's," he replied.
"I wish you would read to us 'The Faithful Shepherdess,'" said Aveline, "you were to have done so at Sorrento, only you had not the Author with you."
"Willingly, if you are in the humour for it," said Mr. Haveloc; "but first, Miss Fitzpatrick, I must see you look a little more comfortable; I shall order up a heap of cushions, and install you like 'Lalla Rookh,' before I begin to read."
"Oh! what a Sybarite!" cried Aveline, as he arranged a pile of red silk cushions for her upon the deck, "do look, mamma!"
"I am much obliged to Mr. Haveloc," said Mrs. Fitzpatrick, "and feel very little disposed to quarrel with his luxurious equipments, for really Aveline you do begin to look rather fagged."
"I hope he is clever, this country practitioner," said Mr. Haveloc, looking up suddenly from his task.
"Clever!" cried Aveline. "Mamma would be highly offended with any one else who should presume to call her Mr. Lindsay clever. He is a man of excellent judgment, Mr. Haveloc."
"I am glad of it," said Mr. Haveloc, "for your sake."
Aveline smiled and settled herself to listen.
The day was beautiful, the coast in the distance was reduced to a miniature picture steeped in the most delicious and variegated tints. The air was hot and still, and nothing interrupted the silence but the flapping of a sail, and the gentle sound of the water rising and falling slowly against the side of the vessel.
"We make but little way," said Mr. Haveloc.
"That does not matter. It is pleasant to lie at anchor. Suppose we were becalmed in the midst of the Pacific?" said Aveline.
"With one day's luncheon on board," said Mr. Haveloc.
"It is very pleasant to have run into some great danger, after it is all over," said Aveline.
"That makes the pleasure of horrid dreams," said Mr. Haveloc.
"But they are not distinct—real enough," said Aveline. "Every thing seems to happen through a ground-glass."
"One would think you took opium Miss Fitzpatrick," said Mr. Haveloc laughing.
"So she does, regularly," said Mrs. Fitzpatrick, with an anxious look, and fixing her eyes upon his face.
He looked surprised and pained, opened the book hastily, and began to read.
Aveline was enchanted with 'the Faithful Shepherdess.' Half rising on her cushions, with cheeks flushed, and her large transparent eyes wide open, she feared to lose a single word.
"That is surely the brightest pastoral ever written," said she, as he laid down the book at the close of the first act.
"Do you like it better than 'Comus?'" he asked.
"I do not like to compare them," said Aveline. "But there seems so much less effort in Beaumont and Fletcher's verse. And what stately simplicity in the opening,—what richness in the lyrical movements! They seem to have been inspired by the tawney sunshine of the Greek isles; while all the woodland scenery seems glittering with the fresh dew of an English summer's night."
"And then Milton's 'Comus' labours under the slight disadvantage of not being written first," said Mr. Haveloc.
"Ah! you mean to insinuate that he borrowed some of the ideas," said Aveline laughing.
"Oh! he never borrowed; his was highway robbery, piracy, Miss Fitzpatrick."
"You do not like Milton, I see," said Aveline.
"No. All his feelings were violently personal. His Theory of Divorce was suggested by his sour discontent of his wife. His democracy by the party he espoused. His religion was the harsh bigotry of his faction, not that which improves the individual. And the much admired anecdote of knocking up his daughters in the night, to write his verses, appears to me the coolest instance of selfish vanity I can now recollect. Fancy, Miss Fitzpatrick, your being rudely aroused from some delicious dream to pen down the leaden stanzas of 'Paradise Regained.'"
"Mamma thinks you are talking treason," said Aveline.
"All the good that I know of him is, that when he had got hold of a wrong principle, he was consistent in holding it," continued Mr. Haveloc. "You know he persisted in rejecting the office that Charles the Second was so generous as to offer him."
"It was generous," said Aveline, "for Milton's poetry had not then received the stamp of time, and Charles was not compelled, by opinion, to be liberal to the author of 'Paradise Lost.'"
They continued conversing upon a variety of topics until it was time to take luncheon; and then Mr. Haveloc would not suffer Aveline to move. He brought up every thing upon the deck that he thought she could fancy, and waited upon her with the utmost care.
He was always morbidly affected by sickness. If he had a servant ill, nothing could equal his kindness and attention; and, therefore, it was not surprising that he should show so much solicitude to Aveline's comforts.
In the course of the afternoon, she began to feel very chilly. One shawl after another was wrapped round her without effect. Mr. Haveloc was alarmed, but Mrs. Fitzpatrick said it was always so about that time, and that it would pass away. But when it did pass away, Aveline was in such a state of exhaustion that she could scarcely move into the boat, which was lowered to take her to the shore. A fresh breeze had risen; it was rather rough landing. The boat could not be got close enough to the jetty. Mr. Haveloc, after exchanging a few whispered words with Mrs. Fitzpatrick, sprang out, knee-deep in the water, took Aveline in his arms, and carried her not only to land, but across the shingles, and up the rocky pathway to their cottage, and placed her in safety on the sofa in the drawing-room window, as Mrs. Fitzpatrick, who had been assisted, by the steward, came in at the glass-doors.
Aveline was very much shocked, but what could have been done? She was unable to walk, and the choice rested between Mr. Haveloc and the steward.
Mr. Haveloc began to make his apologies, but they both laughed before he had concluded them. He was earnest in pressing his further services upon the ladies—he wished to be made of use in fetching their medical man.
Aveline laughed, and assured him that she was no worse than usual. She hardly knew what Mr. Lindsay would say to her if she summoned him for nothing. He was very merciless to imaginary ailments.
He could scarcely conceal the mournful interest she inspired. So attenuated, so brilliant with feverish excitement. But assuming a gay air, he took up his hat, told Mrs. Fitzpatrick he should wait on her the next morning, to learn whether she had forgiven him for tiring out her daughter, and begged Aveline to put the best face she could upon the matter, lest Mrs. Fitzpatrick should put a stop to all excursions for the future.
CHAPTER VII
He that would flee from suffering must die,
For life is suffering, and life's cure is death.
The earth, the sea, the radiant orb of day,
The star-bespangled sky, the moon's soft lustre,
These are all beautiful—the rest is fear
And sorrow; and if aught of good may seem
To bless thy lot, count it not happiness.
ÆSOP.
The next morning, as early as he could well hope to be admitted, Mr. Haveloc made his way to Mrs. Fitzpatrick's, carrying with him a cluster of beautiful passion flowers. As he came up to the porch, a gentleman was mounting his horse to ride away, who looked like a medical man, and was, in fact, no other than Mr. Lindsay. The good doctor cast a keen glance at Mr. Haveloc as he passed him, accompanied by a slight shake of the head, which might be supposed to mean, that if he came there as a suitor, his errand was in vain.
Mr. Haveloc not putting this interpretation upon the gesture, simply feared that Miss Fitzpatrick might be worse, rang the bell, was admitted, and entered.
Aveline was lying on the sofa, drawing upon a small stand placed on the table by her side. She extended her hand over the top of the stand to Mr. Haveloc, and assured him playfully that she had kept her word, and had told Mr. Lindsay no tales of her gay doings yesterday.
Mrs. Fitzpatrick shook hands with him in silence.
He went round to look at Aveline's drawing.
"Beautiful! Miss Fitzpatrick," he exclaimed; "how many strides have you made in art since you crossed the Alps?"
"Do you think so? Not so many," said Aveline, laying down her brush. "There is something wrong in the colouring of my sky. But those passion flowers; how splendid! Does your villa produce such treasures as these?"
"Will you come and see?" he said. "I do not know what Mrs. Fitzpatrick will say to my trying to entice you out again; but if you have really recovered your fatigue—"
"Perfectly," said Aveline; "in fact, I enjoyed myself so much that it quite counterbalanced the finale of the expedition."
"What do you say to it, Mrs. Fitzpatrick?" asked Mr. Haveloc, looking through his glass at Aveline's drawing. "A little indigo, I think, would set that sky all to rights."
"Do it for me," said Aveline, offering him a brush.
"It is a serious consideration," said Mrs. Fitzpatrick, trying to appear cheerful. "It will all wash off," said Mr. Haveloc, still going on with the sky.
"I meant the visit to your villa," said Mrs. Fitzpatrick.
"Oh! Miss Fitzpatrick, you have no idea what a singular little animal the owner of my fishing cottage has entailed upon me," said Mr. Haveloc. "I really think I shall buy him, and take him away with me. A Norwegian poney, as sagacious as a dog, and covered with long hair, that I can only compare to ragged tufts of grass."
"I want to see it," said Aveline.
She had been so used to have every wish gratified by her mother, that without being at all selfish, she almost took it for granted that every fancy she formed should be immediately fulfilled.
Mr. Haveloc was much amused by her manner.
"You shall see him whenever you please," he said. "Suppose I bring him here to-morrow, and you ride him to the fishing cottage."
"Oh, mamma! that would be nice," said Aveline.
"My predecessor had a great taste for gardening," said Mr. Haveloc. "His little green-house is absolutely hung with air-plants, and he has some water-plants of equal value and scarcity."
"Oh! but we must see the plants, mamma," said Aveline.
"I think not just yet," said Mrs. Fitzpatrick; "Aveline had better take a short ride first to try her powers, for the villa must be two miles off; and I hardly think her equal to the exertion."
"Oh! do send Mark for the poney, Mr. Haveloc," said Aveline, eagerly. "I will pay poor Mrs. Brand a visit; for it is so long since I have walked down that steep road. Ah! the morning after I came home; that was the last time I was able to take so long a walk."
Mrs. Fitzpatrick remained silent. Mr. Haveloc could see that she was unusually depressed that day about her daughter. "I will go for him, myself," said Mr. Haveloc. "I think there is a side-saddle in the stable, but I hardly know what I am in possession of—for I have not my horses with me."
"But why not send Mark?" said Mrs. Fitzpatrick.
"Because I have nothing on earth to do," said Mr. Haveloc. "I shall see that the poney is cleaned. I shall find the saddle, which I know will not be found if I do not look for it, and bring him here in half the time that a servant would take about it."
"Oh! thank you," said Aveline.
"Mrs. Fitzpatrick looks half unwilling to trust me with you again," said Mr. Haveloc, as he rose.
"No, indeed," said Mrs. Fitzpatrick, "my reluctance is simply to occasion you a walk in the heat, when my servant might so easily save you the trouble."
He came back before they had thought his return possible, and led the poney up to the drawing-room window for Aveline's inspection.
She was delighted with it. The creature was well proportioned, with a sagacious eye, and a small head, half hidden beneath a forest of mane. His hair grew in abundant tufts, like withered grass, and very much of that colour; so that if horses are subject to the same illusions regarding their personal appearance that usually attend the human race, it is probable he imagined himself of snowy whiteness.
Aveline was anxious to set out directly; but Mrs. Fitzpatrick advised that as the sun was still very powerful, Mr. Haveloc should dine with them, and escort them out afterwards. He readily agreed to this arrangement, and spent the time until their early dinner in wandering about the pretty garden and shrubberies with Mrs. Fitzpatrick; while Aveline, reclining in a low chair by the window, had the pleasure of keeping him continually in sight.
Mrs. Fitzpatrick's dejection increased when she was away from her daughter. She rarely spoke, and the few words she uttered were in that low, weak voice which is a sufficient indication, to the experienced of mental distress.
Mr. Haveloc opened upon the topic at once.
"I am truly sorry," he said, "to find that Miss Fitzpatrick is so little able to bear fatigue. I hope you really have reason to be perfectly satisfied with your medical adviser."
"Quite," said Mrs. Fitzpatrick, turning to him her face as pale as death, "all that is possible has been done."
"Good Heaven! you do not mean—" he exclaimed, "you cannot so entirely—"
Mrs. Fitzpatrick shook her head. He seemed very much shocked; but it was clear to her that his manner was not that of a person who felt a shade of attachment to her daughter, or anything beyond the natural sympathy which the early fate of so interesting a creature must awaken. Knowing, as she did, the too certain state of Aveline's health, she could scarcely regret that he was spared the misery of loving her daughter: her only wish was to keep him near her while she lived. In Aveline's weak condition, she was certain that she could not support the pain of being again separated from him; and she came to a resolution, at once dignified and singular. She determined to ask him to continue his visits as long as her daughter was capable of deriving satisfaction from them.
After a painful pause of a few moments, he himself renewed the subject.
"It is so natural you should be nervous;—so reasonable you should see her case in a more desponding light than anyone else," he said; "you forget she has youth, repose, all the care that can be lavished upon the most delicate invalid; there are so many things in her favour."
"And do you not think," said Mrs. Fitzpatrick, "that I have said all this to myself a thousand times. That I have prayed, struggled, hoped, till hope was vain?"
He looked greatly distressed; in reality much more so for Mrs. Fitzpatrick than for Aveline. He had a strong regard, a sincere friendship for the mother; for the daughter he merely felt the interest which her precarious health had recently awakened.
"But is there nothing," said he eagerly, "a different treatment, a warmer climate. Why not try Madeira? So many have derived benefit—"
"Because, in summer, no climate can surpass our own in this place," said Mrs. Fitzpatrick, "and Aveline will not live to be tried by another winter."
There was something shocking in her calmness. He looked at her as if not comprehending what she said.
"For all sorrow," she continued, as if answering some thought of her own, "it wears you out, or you wear it out, so there is an end either way; and a great end, Mr. Haveloc, in the education of the soul. An end, so important, that we ought not to shrink so cowardly from the agony of the means."
"I wish earnestly it was in my power to offer you consolation, or relief," he said, "but this is a case in which words are idle."
"And yet there is one thing, Mr. Haveloc, which, if Aveline's fate were less certain, I could never propose to you. Your society is an amusement to her, and in sickness every enjoyment is so curtailed, that I dread for her the slightest deprivation. Can I ask you to devote some of your time to us while you remain in the neighbourhood; can I even ask that you should prolong your stay beyond what you might have originally intended. If she should linger—"
Her voice failed her.
"Most willingly, my dear Mrs. Fitzpatrick," he exclaimed with eagerness, "sickness admits of few alleviations. I should be thankful, indeed, if I could afford any comfort to your daughter or yourself."
"You see how desperate I have become," said Mrs. Fitzpatrick with a smile, "to demand of you such a melancholy seclusion. You, whose wealth and position would make you so welcome, so caressed in general society. But all considerations give way to the approach of death."
"Good Heaven! Can you believe such a thought could have a moment's weight with me?" he said hastily, "is life a May game that we should only count the hours devoted to revelry and enjoyment? I esteem myself fortunate that I am able to be with you at a time of so much anxiety and distress."
"I thought this of you. I had every reason to think it," said Mrs. Fitzpatrick, pressing the hand he extended to her, "stay, there is Aveline; what could induce her to come out?"
As she stood at the end of the narrow shaded avenue beckoning to them, the soft fluttering of her white dress, and the shadowy outline of her figure seemed like a dim foreboding of the fate which awaited her. Mr. Haveloc hastened to her side.
"Are you coming to dinner, you two?" said she playfully, "I have no mind to be kept waiting, since I cannot begin my ride until that business is over."
"And could you not have sent a servant to us," he said, "was it needful that you should tire yourself by coming out in the heat? I shall lock up the poney if you commit any imprudences. Take my arm, and keep in the shade."
"You would make me out to be so very ill," said Aveline as she leaned on him. "I do not despair of having a good gallop on the poney yet. Oh! Mr. Haveloc, you have not told me his name. What is it?"
"Hakon Jarl."
"Delightful! Mamma, did you ever hear such a name? From Oehlenschläger's tragedy. He shall have some bread from our dinner table."
And Aveline was as good as her word, and fed the poney from the window instead of eating her own dinner.