“Well, hang it all, Jem, suppose I am; surely, as Glynne’s father, if I want to see the man who insulted her, and talk to him, there’s no occasion for you to interfere.”
“Jack, you are out of temper,” said the major. “You are going to make a – ”
“Fool of myself, eh? There, say it, man, say it,” cried the baronet hastily.
“I shall not say anything of the kind, Jack,” replied the major good-humouredly; “but let’s talk sensibly, old fellow.”
“Yes, of course, sensibly,” cried Sir John sharply. “You are going to turn advocate and speak on that telescopic scoundrel’s behalf. What the dickens do you mean by sticking yourself here when I’m going out on business!”
“Tchut! tchut, Jack! don’t be so confoundedly peppery,” cried the major. “Now, look here, boy, what are you going to do?”
“Going to do? I’m going to horsewhip that fellow, and make him write a humble letter of apology to Rob. If he doesn’t, Rob shall call him out.”
“Now, my dear Jack, don’t talk nonsense!” cried the major.
“Nonsense, sir? It isn’t nonsense. It’s all very fine for you, with your scientific humbug, to be making friends with the star-gazing scoundrel. You fellows always hang together and back each other up. But look here, Jem, I’m not going to be meddled with in this matter. You have interfered enough.”
“I only want you, as a gentleman, to behave like a gentleman to Mr Alleyne.”
“You leave me alone for that, Jem. Insolence! The poor girl came home all of a tremble. She’s quite white this morning, and looks as if she ought to have a doctor to her. It’s your fault too, Jem, ’pon my word it is.”
“My fault, my dear brother,” said the major earnestly; “indeed, no. I would not say a word that should interfere with Glynne’s happiness.”
“But you did, sir; you did when she was first engaged.”
“Only to you, Jack. I did not like the engagement, and I don’t like it; but I have always since I got over the first shock – ”
“Hang it, Jem, don’t talk like that, man. Anyone would think that you had been stricken down by some terrible trouble.”
“It was and has been a terrible trouble to me, Jack,” said the major quietly. “But there, I have done. Don’t be angry with me. Let’s talk about what you are going to do.”
All this time Sir John had been moving slowly in the direction of The Firs, with the major’s hand resting upon his arm.
“There’s no occasion to talk about it that I see; I’m going to have a few words with that Mr Alleyne, and this I conceive it to be my duty to do. There, there’s an end to it.”
“Well, but is it wise?” said the major. “It seems that Mr Alleyne has formed a deep attachment to Glynne.”
“Such insolence! A man in his position!”
“And, carried away by his feelings, he declared his love for her.”
“As if such a man as he has a right to force himself upon a girl in Glynne’s position. It is preposterous.”
“It was in bad taste – a mistake, for a man who knew of Glynne’s engagement to speak as he did. But young men do not always think before they speak, nor old ones neither, Jack.”
“Tchah! nonsense. There, go on and hunt fungi. Be off now, Jem.”
“Be off? No; I’m coming with you as far as The Firs.”
“What! Coming with me?”
“Yes; I shall come and be present at the meeting. I don’t want my brother to forget himself.”
“Jem!”
“There, my dear Jack, it is of no use for you to be cross – I mean what I say. It will not do for you to get into one of your passions.”
“My passions?”
“Yes, your passions. It will cause trouble with Alleyne.”
“A scoundrel!”
“No, he is not a scoundrel, Jack. It will upset his little sister.”
“A confounded jade!” cried Sir John. “If I had known what I know now, the minx should never have entered my doors.”
“Steady, Jack.”
“I am steady, sir. A little heartless flirt, setting her cap at every man she sees. Rolph won’t own to it, but I have it on very good authority that the poor fellow could not stir without that vixen being on the watch for him, and meeting him somewhere.”
The major was silent.
“And all the time she knew that he was engaged to Glynne, and she was professing to be the best of friends to the poor child.”
The major drew his breath very hard.
“There, you’d better be off now, Jem,” cried Sir John. “I’m going just to let that fellow Alleyne have a bit of my mind, and then I shall be better.”
“But Mrs Alleyne is a most estimable lady. Had you not better give the matter up? Let it slide, my dear Jack. These troubles soon die a natural death.”
“I’m going to kill this one, Jem. Then we’ll bury it,” said Sir John grimly. “Now, you be off. I sha’n’t upset Mrs Alleyne. I won’t see her.”
“Nor yet Lucy Alleyne?”
“Not if she keeps out of my way. Ugh! I haven’t patience with the smooth-spoken little minx. It’s horrible: such depravity in one so young.”
The major sighed, and kept tightly hold of his brother’s arm. Two or three times over he had turned rather red in the face, the flush playing to and fro as if an angry storm were arising, but he mastered himself, and held his squadron of angry words well in hand.
“Now, look here, Jem,” said the baronet at last, as they came in sight of The Firs, “I don’t want to be hampered with you. Do go back.”
“My dear Jack, as an old soldier, let me tell you that it is next to impossible to make an advance without being hampered with baggage and the commissariat. You may call me which you please, but if you are going to attack the people at The Firs, you must have me on your back, so take it as calmly as you can.”
Sir John uttered an angry grunt, and was disposed to explode, but, by a strong effort, he got over his fit.
“If you will insist upon having a finger in the pie, come on then,” he cried.
“Yes, I’ll come on,” said the major, “and I know I need say no more to you about being calm and gentlemanly. There, I won’t say another syllable.”
In fact neither spoke a word till they had climbed up the sandy path and reached the gate at The Firs, where Sir John set the bell clanging loudly, and Eliza hurried down.
Yes; master was at home, and missus and Miss Lucy, the girl hastened to reply.
“I want to see Mr Alleyne,” said Sir John sharply, and Eliza showed them into the drawing-room, up and down whose faded carpet Sir John walked, fuming, while the major bent down over a few pretty little water-colour sketches, evidently the work of Lucy at some idle time.
Meanwhile Eliza had hurriedly made a communication to Mrs Alleyne, and terribly alarmed Lucy, who was for preventing Alleyne from meeting the brothers.
“No,” said Mrs Alleyne sternly, “he must see them. If he is to blame, let him frankly own it. If the fault be on their side, let them apologise to my son.”
The result was that at her earnest prayer Lucy was allowed to run into the observatory to her brother, to prepare him for the visitors.
“Sir John – Major Day,” said Alleyne, calmly. “I will come to them. No: let them be shown in here.”
Perhaps he felt that he would be stronger on his own ground, surrounded by his instruments, than in the chilly drawing-room, where he knew he was out of place.
“But, Moray, dear, you will not be angry and passionate. You will not quarrel with Sir John.”
“Angry?” said Alleyne calmly. “I cannot tell. He might say things to me that will make me angry; but do not be afraid, I shall not quarrel.”
“You promise me that, dear?”
“I promise you.”
Lucy threw her arms about his neck and kissed him, and then ran out of the observatory, into which Sir John and the major were introduced a few minutes later.
Alleyne was right. He was stronger in his own place, for, surrounded as he was by the various strange implements used in his studies, he seemed to Sir John someone far more imposing than the simple dreamy man, whom he had come, as he called it, to put down.
Alleyne came from where he was standing with his hand resting upon some papers, and, bowing formally, he pointed to chairs, for it needed no words to tell that this was no friendly visit.
“I’ve called, Mr Alleyne,” said Sir John, giving his stick a twist, and then a thump down upon the floor, “to ask for some explanation.”
The major laid a warning hand upon his arm, for Sir John’s voice was increasing in volume. In fact he had been impressed with the fact that his task was not so easy a one as he had imagined, and hence he was glad to have the sound of his own words to help work up the passion necessary to carry out his purpose.
He lowered his tone directly, though, in obedience to his brother’s hint, and continued his discourse angrily, but still as a gentleman should; and he afterwards owned to his brother that he forgot all about the horse-whipping he had designed from the moment he entered the room.
“Those telescopes and the quicksilver trough and instruments put it all out of mind, Jem,” he afterwards said. “One couldn’t thrash a man who looks like a sage; whose every word and tone seems to say that he is your superior.”
Sir John finished a sufficiently angry tirade, in which he pointed out that Alleyne had met with gentlemanly courtesy, that he had been treated with every confidence, and made the friend of the family. Miss Day had made a companion of his sister, and nothing had been wanting on his part; while, on the other hand, Alleyne’s conduct, Sir John said, had culminated in what was little better than an outrage.
“There, sir,” he exclaimed, by way of a finish, with his face very red and with a tremendous thump of his stick upon the floor. “Now, what have you to say?”
Alleyne stood before them deadly pale, and with a fine dew glistening upon his forehead; but there was no look of shame or dread upon his face, which rather bore the aspect of one lately smitten by some severe mental blow from which he had not yet recovered.
He gazed straight before him without meeting the eyes of either of his visitors, as if thinking of what reply he should find to a question that stung him to the heart. Then his eyes fell, and the wrinkles that formed in his brow made him look, at least, ten years older.
Just then, as Sir John was chafing, and without thoroughly owning to it, wishing that he had let matters rest, the major said softly, —
“I thought I would come over with my brother, Mr Alleyne. I am sorry that this visit was deemed necessary.”
“Hang it all, Jem, don’t take sides with the enemy! And you a soldier, too.”
“I take no sides, John,” replied the major, quietly. “Had we not better end this interview?”
“I am waiting to hear what Mr Alleyne has to say to the father of the lady he insulted,” cried the baronet warmly; and these words acted like a spur to Alleyne, who turned upon him proudly.
“It was no insult, Sir John, to tell her that I loved her,” he said.
“But I say it was, sir, knowing as you did that she was engaged to Captain Rolph. Confound it all, sir, it was positively disgraceful. I am her father, sir, and I demand an apology – a full apology at once.”
Alleyne looked at him for a few moments in silence, and then, with his lips quivering, he spoke in a low deep voice, —
“Tell her, Sir John, that in answer to your demand I humbly ask forgiveness if I have given her pain. I regret my words most bitterly, and that I would they had been unsaid – that I ask her pardon.”
“That is enough, I think,” said Sir John, with a show of importance in his speech, but with a look in his eye that betokened more and more his dissatisfaction with his task.
“Quite,” said the major gravely. “If an apology was necessary, Mr Alleyne has made the amende honorable.”
“Exactly,” said Sir John impatiently, as if he were on the magisterial bench, and some poacher had been brought before him. “And now, sir, what am I to say to Captain Rolph?”
The major laid his hand upon his brother’s arm, but he could not check his words, and he turned round directly after, almost startled by the vehemence with which Alleyne spoke, with his keen eyes first upon one brother, then upon the other.
“Tell Captain Rolph, gentlemen, if he wishes for an apology to come and ask it of me himself.”
“Sir,” began Sir John; but the major quickly interposed.
“Mr Alleyne is quite right, John,” he said. “He has apologised to the father of the lady he is accused of insulting; that ought to be sufficient. If Rolph feels aggrieved, it should be his duty to himself apply for redress.”
“But – ” began Sir John.
“That will do, my dear John,” said the major firmly. “You have performed the duty you came to fulfil; now let us go. Mr Alleyne, for my part, I am very sorry this has happened – good-day.”
Alleyne bowed, and Sir John, who was feeling beaten, allowed the major to lead him out of the house, the latter feeling quite relieved when they were in the lane, for he had been dreading the coming of Mrs Alleyne or Lucy for the last ten minutes of their visit.
“Hah!” he ejaculated, breathing more freely, “I am glad that is over.”
“But it isn’t over,” cried Sir John, who was exceedingly unsettled in his mind. “Why, Jem, your confounded interference has spoiled the whole affair.”
“Nonsense, Jack, he apologised very handsomely; what more would you have?”
“What more would I have! How am I to face Rob? What am I to say when he asks me what apology the fellow made?”
“My dear Jack,” said the major, “I may be wrong, but I look upon Mr Alleyne as a thorough gentleman.”
“Oh, do you?”
“Yes, my boy, I do; and it is very unseemly, to my way of thinking, for you to be speaking of him as ‘that fellow’ or ‘the fellow.’ If your chosen son-in-law were one half as much of a gentleman in his conduct I should feel a great deal more happy over this match.”
Sir John’s face flushed of a deeper red, and it looked as if fierce words would ensue between the brothers; but as much ire as could dwell in Sir John’s genial spirit had been used up in the encounter with Alleyne, and it required many hours for the reserve to be refilled.
Hence, then, he bore in silence several rather plain remarks uttered by his brother, and walked back to the park, where they encountered Rolph coming rapidly down the long drive.
“Seems in a hurry to hear our news,” said Sir John.
“Pshaw!” ejaculated the major; “he has not seen us. He is training for something or another.”
“Nonsense, Jem. How spitefully you speak. He is coming to meet us, I tell you.”
Sir John’s words did not carry conviction with them, for it was strange that if the captain were coming to meet them, he should be running in a very peculiar manner, with his fists clenched and his eyes bent upon the ground; and, in fact, as he reached something white, which proved to be a pocket handkerchief tied to a cane stuck in the ground, he turned suddenly, and ran off in the opposite direction.
“Humph!” grumbled Sir John; “it does look as if he were having a run.”
“Very much,” said the major, “five hundred yards run along the carriage drive. What is he training for now?”
“Tchah!” ejaculated Sir John; “don’t ask me. Here, hi! Rob! Hang the fellow: is he deaf?”
Rolph seemed to be. He ran, growing more distant every moment, while, as Sir John trudged on, he was evidently fretting and fuming, the more, too, that the major seemed to be in a malicious spirit, and to enjoy worrying him about his choice.
“Poor fellow!” he said; “he is overdone with impatience to hear the result of your visit, and can only keep down his excitement by running hard.”
“Look here, Jem, if you want to quarrel, say so, and I’ll take another path to the house, for I’m not in the humour to have words.”
“I am,” said the major, “a good many. I feel as if there is nothing that would agree with me better than a deuced good quarrel with somebody.”
“Then hang it, man, why didn’t you quarrel with Alleyne – take your niece’s part?”
“Alleyne is not a man I could quarrel with,” said the major sharply. “There, I’ll go and have a few words with Rolph about the cool way in which he takes a quarrel that you look upon as almost vital.”
“No, no, for goodness sake don’t do anything of the kind,” cried Sir John sharply, and he caught his brother by the shoulder. “My dear Jem, don’t be absurd.”
The major muttered something that was inaudible, and struck right across the park towards the house, by the lawn, while Sir John, feeling out of humour with his brother, with Rolph, and even with himself, went on along the carriage drive to encounter his prospective son-in-law after a few minutes, perspiring and panting after running fifteen hundred yards towards a mile.
“Hullo! back?” panted Rolph.
“Yes,” said Sir John abruptly.
“Well, what did he say?”
“I’ll tell you after dinner,” replied Sir John sourly; “your training must be too important to be left.”
“What did he mean?” said Rolph to himself as he stood watching Sir John’s retreating form. “Why, the old boy looks as if he had been huffed. Bah! I wish he wouldn’t come and stop me when I’m running; he has given me quite a chill.”
Volume Three – Chapter Two.
The Stars at the Nadir
“I will see him again, Mrs Alleyne, and try a little more persuasion; perhaps he will yield.”
“But are you sure you are right, Mr Oldroyd? I know my son’s constitution so well. Would it be better to go to some specialist?”
“My dear madam, I would advise you directly to persuade him to go up to town and see any of our magnates, but it would be so much money wasted.”
“But he seems so ill again!” sighed Mrs Alleyne.
“He does, indeed, but this illness is one of the simplest of ailments. It needs no doctor to tell you what it is. Really, Mrs Alleyne, if you will set maternal anxiety aside for one moment, and look at your son as you would at a stranger, you will see directly what is wrong. It is only an aggravated form of the complaint for which you consulted me before.”
“If I could only feel so,” sighed Mrs Alleyne.
“Really, madam, you may,” replied Oldroyd. “When you first called me in, you know what I prescribed, and how much better he grew. I prescribe the same again. If we set Nature and her simple laws at defiance, she will punish us.”
“But he grows worse,” sighed Mrs Alleyne. “He devotes himself more and more to his studies, and it is hard work to get him out of the observatory. He says he has some discovery on the way, and to make that he is turning himself into an old man. Will you go and see him now?”
Oldroyd bowed his acquiescence, and rose to go.
“You had better go alone,” said Mrs Alleyne, “as if you had called in as a friend. He is very sensitive and strange at times, and I should not like him to think that I had sent for you.”
“It would be as well not,” said Oldroyd; and, taking the familiar way, he was crossing the hall, when he came suddenly upon Lucy, who stopped short, turned very red, turned hastily, and hurried through the next door, which closed after her with quite a bang.
Oldroyd’s brow filled with lines, and he drew a long breath as he went on to the door of the observatory, knocked, and, receiving no answer, turned the handle gently and stepped in, closing the door behind him.
He stood for a few minutes in what seemed to be intense darkness; but as his eyes grew more accustomed to the great place, he could see that through the closed shutters a white stream of light came here and there, and on one side there was a very small, closely-shaded lamp, which threw a ring of softened yellow light down upon a sheet of paper covered with figures. Saving these faint traces of light all was gloom and obscurity, through which loomed out in a weirdly, grotesque fashion the great tubes and pedestals and wheels of the various instruments that stood in the place. On one side, too, a bright ray of light shone from a spot near the floor, and, after a moment or two, Oldroyd recalled that there stood the large trough of mercury, glittering like a mirror, and now reflecting a ray of light as if it were a star.
The silence was perfect, not a breath could be heard, and it was some few minutes before Oldroyd made out that his friend was seated on the other side of the table that bore the shaded lamp, his head resting upon his hand, perfectly motionless, but whether asleep or thinking it was impossible to say.
Oldroyd had not seen the astronomer for some weeks. There had been no falling off from the friendly feeling existing between them, but Alleyne had completely secluded himself since the encounter with Rolph in the fir wood, and, for reasons of his own, Oldroyd had refrained from calling, the principal cause being, as he told himself, a desire not to encounter Lucy.
He stood waiting for a short time watching the dimly-seen figure, and half-expecting that it would move and speak; but the minutes sped on, and the dead silence continued till Oldroyd, as he gave another look round the gloomy place, black as night in the early part of the afternoon of a sunny day, could not help saying to himself – “How can a man expect health when he shuts himself up in such a tomb?”
He crossed the place cautiously, and with outstretched hands, lest he should fall over a chair or philosophical instrument; but though he made some little noise, Alleyne did not stir, even when his visitor was close up to the table, looking down upon the head resting upon the dimly-seen hand.
“He must be asleep, worn out with watching,” thought Oldroyd; and he remained silent again for a few minutes, waiting for his friend to move. But Alleyne remained motionless; and now the visitor could see that his hair was rough and untended, and that he was in a loose kind of dressing-gown.
“Alleyne! Alleyne!” said Oldroyd at last, but there was no movement. “Alleyne!” cried Oldroyd, louder now, but without result, and, feeling startled, he caught the shade from the lamp, so that the light might fall upon the heavily-bearded face.
As he did so, Alleyne moved, slowly raising his head, and letting his hand drop till he was gazing full at his visitor.
“Were you asleep?” said Oldroyd uneasily, “or are you ill?”
“Asleep? – ill?” replied Alleyne, in a low, dreamy voice, his eyes blinking uneasily in the light, as he displayed a white and ghastly face to his visitor, one that was startling in its aspect. “No, I am quite well. I was thinking.”
Oldroyd was not ignorant of his friend’s trouble, but he was surprised and shocked at the change that had taken place in so short a time; and laying his hand upon Alleyne’s shoulder, and closely scanning the deeply-lined, ashy face, he said quietly, —
“May I open a shutter or two, and admit the light?”
“Light? – shutter?” said Alleyne dreamily; “is it morning?”
“Yes; glorious sunny morning, man. There, now we can see each other,” cried Oldroyd cheerfully, as he threw back one or two shutters. “Why, Alleyne, how you do stick to the work.”
“Yes – yes,” in a low, dreamy voice. “There is so much to do, and one gets on so slowly.”
“Big problem on, I suppose, as usual, eh?”
“Yes; a difficult problem,” said Alleyne vacantly. “These things take time.”
“Ah, I suppose so,” replied Oldroyd. “How’s the garden getting on now?”
“Garden? – the garden! Oh, yes; I had forgotten. Very well, I think; but I have been too much occupied for the past few weeks – months – weeks to attend to it myself.”
“I suppose so. One has to work hard to do more than one’s fellows, eh?”
Alleyne looked at him blankly.
“Yes, one has to work hard,” he replied.
“I thought, perhaps, as you have been shut up so much lately, you would come and have a round with me,” continued Oldroyd. “It is a splendid day.”
Alleyne looked at him dreamily, as if he felt that something of the brightness of the outer day had accompanied his friend into the room, but he merely shook his head.
“Oh, nonsense, man!” cried Oldroyd, speaking with energy. “You work too hard. I am sure you do.”
“I am obliged,” said Alleyne gravely. “It is the only rest I have.”
He seemed to be growing more animated already, and to be fully awakened to the presence of his friend, for his next words possessed more energy, when, in reply to a little more persuasion, he exclaimed, —
“Don’t ask me, Oldroyd. I have, I tell you, too much to do.”
It seemed useless to press him further, and the doctor felt that it would be unwise, perhaps, to say more, so he took a seat and waited for Alleyne to speak again, apparently like any idler who might have called, but really observant of him all the time.
