The Daltons; Or, Three Roads In Life. Volume II

CHAPTER XVIII. AN ACT OF SETTLEMENT

Were we disposed to heroics, we might compare Mrs. Ricketts’s sensations, on entering the grounds of the villa, to the feelings experienced by the ancient Gauls when, from the heights of the Alps, they gazed down on the fertile plains of Italy. If less colored by the glorious hues of conquering ambition, they were not the less practical. She saw that, with her habitual good fortune, she had piloted the Rickettses’ barque into a safe and pleasant anchorage, where she might at her leisure refit and lay in stores for future voyaging. Already she knew poor Dalton, as she herself said, from “cover to cover,” – she had sounded all the shallows and shoals of his nature, and read his vanity, his vainglorious importance, and his selfish pride, as though they were printed on his forehead. Were Nelly to be like Kate, the victory, she thought, could not be very difficult. “Let her have but one predominant passion, and be it love of admiration, avarice, a taste for dress, for scandal, or for grand society, it matters not, I’ll soon make her my own.”

“This will do, Martha!” whispered she, in Miss Ricketts’s ear, as they drove up the approach.

“I think so,” was the low-uttered reply.

“Tell Scroope to be cautious, – very cautious,” whispered she once more; and then turned to Dalton, to expatiate on the beauty of the grounds, and the exquisite taste displayed in their arrangement.

“It has cost me a mint of money,” said Dalton, giving way irresistibly to his instinct of boastfulness. “Many of those trees you see there came from Spain and Portugal; and not only the trees, but the earth that’s round them.”

“Did you hear that, Martha?” interposed Mrs. Rick-etts. “Mr. Dalton very wisely remarks that man is of all lands, while the inferior productions of nature require their native soils as a condition of existence.”

“Yes, indeed,” said Dalton, fathering the sentiment at once; “‘tis only the blacks that can’t bear the cowld. But, after all, maybe they ‘re not the same as ourselves.”

“I own I never could think them so,” smiled Mrs. Rick-etts, as though the very appearance of Peter Dalton had confirmed the prejudice.

“Faix! I’m glad to hear you say that,” said he, delightedly. “Tis many’s the battle Nelly and me has about that very thing. There’s the villa, now – what d’ ye think of it?”

“Charming – beautiful – a paradise!”

“Quite a paradise!” echoed Martha.

“‘T is a mighty expensive paradise, let me tell you,” broke in Peter. “I’ve a gardener, and four chaps under him, and sorrow a thing I ever see them do but cut nosegays and stick little bits of wood in the ground, with hard names writ on them; that’s what they call gardening here. As for a spade or a hoe, there’s not one in the country; they do everything with a case-knife and watering-pot.”

“You amaze me,” said Mrs. Ricketts, who was determined on being instructed in horticulture.

“There’s a fellow now, with a bundle of moss-roses for Nelly, and there’s another putting out the parrot’s cage under a tree, – that’s the day’s work for both of them.”

“Are you not happy to think how your ample means diffuse ease and enjoyment on all round you? Don’t tell me that the pleasure you feel is not perfect ecstasy.”

“That’s one way of considering it,” said Dalton, dubiously, for he was not quite sure whether he could or could not yield his concurrence.

“But if people did n’t la-la-la – ”

“Lay abed, you mean,” cried Dalton; “that’s just what they do; a German wouldn’t ask to awake at all, if it wasn’t to light his pipe.”

“I meant la-la-labor; if they did n’t la-labor the ground, we should all be starved.”

“No political economy, Scroope,” cried Mrs. Ricketts; “I will not permit it. That dreadful science is a passion with him, Mr. Dal ton.”

“Is it?” said Peter, confusedly, to whose ears the word “economy” only suggested notions of saving and sparing. “I can only say,” added he, after a pause, “tastes differ, and I never could abide it at all.”

“I was certain of it,” resumed Mrs. Ricketts; “but here comes a young lady towards us, – Miss Dalton, I feel it must be.”

The surmise was quite correct. It was Nelly, who, in expectation of meeting her father, had walked down from the house, and now, seeing a carriage, stood half irresolute what to do.

“Yes, that’s Nelly,” cried Dalton, springing down to the ground; “she’ll be off now, for she thinks it’s visitors come to see the place.”

While Dalton hastened to overtake his daughter, Mrs. Ricketts had time to descend and shake out all her plumage, – a proceeding of manual dexterity to which Martha mainly contributed; indeed, it was almost artistic in its way, for while feathers were disposed to droop here, and lace taught to fall gracefully there, the fair Zoe assumed the peculiar mood in which she determined on conquest.

“How do I look, Martha?” said she, bridling up, and then smiling.

“Very sweetly, – quite charming,” replied Martha.

“I know that,” said the other, pettishly; “but am I maternal, – am I affectionate?”

“Very maternal, – most affectionate,” was the answer.

“You’re a fool!” said Mrs. Ricketts, contemptuously; but had barely time to restore her features to their original blandness, when Nelly came up. The few words in which her father had announced Mrs. Ricketts spoke of her as one who had known and been kind to Kate, and Nelly wanted no stronger recommendation to her esteem.

The quiet, gentle manner of the young girl, the almost humble simplicity of her dress, at once suggested to Mrs. Ricketts the tone proper for the occasion, and she decided on being natural; which, to say truth, was the most remote thing from nature it is well possible to conceive. Poor Nelly was not, however, a very shrewd critic, and she felt quite happy to be so much at her ease as they walked along to the house together.

Mrs. Ricketts saw that Kate was the key-note to all her sister’s affection, and therefore talked away of her unceasingly. To have heard her, one would have thought they had been inseparable, and that Kate had confided to the dear old lady the most secret thoughts of her heart. The amiable Zoe did, indeed, contrive to effect this rather by the aid of an occasional sigh, a tone of lamentation and sorrow, than by direct assertion; all conveying the impression that she was cut to the heart about something, but would rather be “brayed in a mortar” than tell it. Martha’s mild and submissive manner won rapidly on Nelly, and she wondered whether Kate had liked her. In fact, the visitors were all so very unlike the usual company her father presented to her, she felt disposed to think the best of them; and even Scroope came in for a share of her good opinion.

The interior of the villa changed the current of conversation, and now Mrs. Ricketts felt herself at home examining the rich brocade of the hangings, the bronzes, and the inlaid tables.

“Lyons silk, – twenty-four francs a metre!” whispered she to Scroope.

“I thought they had n’t a s-s-sixpence,” observed the other.

“And these things are new, Scroope! – all new!”

“I – I – I was observing that, sister.”

“What a creature he is, Scroope! – what a creature!”

“And the daughter, I suspect, is only ha-ha-half-witted.”

“Humph!” ejaculated Zoe, as though she did not quite coincide with that opinion.

The confidential dialogue was broken in upon by Dalton, who, having dragged the poor General over the terrace and the flower-garden, was now showing him the inside of the dwelling.

“If I could but see dear Kate here!” sighed Mrs. Ricketts, as she slowly sank into a downy chair, “I’d fancy this was home. It’s all so like herself, – such graceful elegance, such tasteful splendor.”

“It’s neat, – I think it’s neat,” said Dalton, almost bursting with the effort to repress his delight.

“Oh, sir, it’s princely! It’s worthy the great name of its possessor. Dear Kate often told me of her beautiful home.”

“I thought you li-li-lived over a toy-shop? Foglass said you li-lived – ”

“So we did while the place was getting ready,” said Dalton, flushing.

“Just let me sit here, and watch the rippling of that shining river!” sighed Mrs. Ricketts, laying her hand on Dalton’s, and, by a melting look, withdrawing him from Scroope’s unlucky reminiscence. “If I could but pass the night here, I feel it would be ecstasy.”

“What easier, if it’s in earnest you are?” cried Dalton. “We never make use of this little drawing-room. Nelly will get you a bed put up in five minutes.”

“Is n’t that Irish, Scroope? – is n’t that what I often told you of Ireland?” cried Zoe, as her eyes glistened.

“Well, but I’m not joking,” resumed Dalton; “small as the place is, we can make room for you all. We ‘ll put Miss Martha in Nelly’s room, and the General can have mine; and there’s a mighty snug tittle place for you in the garden.”

“Oh, dear, dear, dear Ireland, how I love you!” said Mrs. Ricketts, closing her eyes, and affecting to talk in her sleep.

“There’s worse places,” murmured Dalton, who drank in national flattery as the pleasantest “tipple” after personal. “But say the word, now, and see if we won’t make you comfortable.”

“Comfortable! – you mean happy, supremely happy,” ejaculated Zoe.

“And there’s no inconvenience in it, none whatever,” continued Dalton, who now was breast-high in his plot. “That’s a fine thing in this little town of Baden; you can have everything at a moment’s warning, from a sirloin of beef to a strait-waistcoat.”

Now Mrs. Ricketts laughed till her eyes overflowed with tears, at Dalton’s drollery; and Scroope, too, cackled his own peculiar cry; and the old General chimed in with a faint wheezing sound, – a cross between the wail of an infant and a death-rattle; in the midst of which Dalton hurried away to seek Nelly, who was showing the garden to Martha.

“Now, mind me, Scroope,” cried Mrs. Ricketts, as soon as they were alone; “no selfishness, no eternal trouble about your own comfort. We may probably pass the summer here, and – ”

“But I – I – I won’t sleep under the stairs, I – I – I promise you,” cried he, angrily.

“You had a dear little room, with a lovely view, at Noëringen. You are most ungrateful.”

“It was a d-d ear little room, six feet sqnare, and looked ont on a tannery. My skin would have been leather if I had st-st-stayed another week in it.”

“Martha slept in a wardrobe, and never complained.”

“For that matter, I passed two months in a sh-shower-bath,” cried Scroope; “but I – I won’t do it a-any more.”

To what excesses his rebellious spirit might have carried him it is hard to say, for Dalton now came up with Nelly, who was no less eager than her father to offer the hospitalities of the villa. At the hazard of detracting in the reader’s esteem from all this generous liberality, we feel bound to add that neither Dalton nor his daughter ever speculated on the lengthened sojourn which Mrs. Ricketts’s more prophetic spirit foreshadowed.

The accidental mistake about the hotel first suggested the offer, which of course the next day was sure to obviate. And now, as it has so often been an unpleasant task to record little flaws and frailties of the Rickettses’ nature, let us take the opportunity of mentioning some traits of an opposite kind, which, even as a “set-off,” are not valueless. Nothing could be more truly amiable than the conduct of the whole family when the question of their stay had been resolved upon. Had Scroope been bred a cabinet-maker, he could n’t have been handier with bed-screws, laths, and curtain-rods. Martha, divested of shawl and bonnet, arranged toilet-tables and looking-glasses like the most accomplished housemaid; while, reclining in her easy-chair, the fair Zoe vouchsafed praises on all the efforts around her, and nodded, as Jove might, on mortal endeavors to conciliate him.

Poor Nelly was in ecstasy at all this goodness; such a united family was a perfect picture. Nothing seemed to inconvenience them, – nothing went wrong. There was a delightfully playful spirit in the way they met and conquered little difficulties, and whenever hard pushed by fate there was a wonderful reticule of Mrs. Ricketts’s which was sure to contain something to extricate them at once. Since Aladdin’s lamp, there never was such a magical contrivance as that bag; and the Wizard of the North, who makes pancakes in a gentleman’s hat and restores it unstained, and who, from the narrow limits of a snuff-box, takes out feathers enough to stuff a pillow-case, would have paled before the less surprising but more practical resources of the “Rickettses’ sack.”

Various articles of toilet necessity, from objects peculiar to the lady’s own, down to the General’s razors, made their appearance. An impertinent curiosity might have asked why a lady going to dine at a public ordinary should have carried about with her such an array of flannel jackets, cordials, lotions, slippers, hair-brashes, and nightcaps; but it is more than likely that Mrs. Ricketts would have smiled at the short-sighted simplicity of the questioner, as she certainly did at poor Nelly’s face of quiet astonishment.

It was a downright pleasure to make sacrifices for people so ready to accommodate themselves to circumstances, and who seemed to possess a physical pliancy not inferior to the mental one. The General wanted no window to shave at. Martha could bestow herself within limits that seemed impossible to humanity. As for Scroope, he was what French dramatists call a “grand utility,” – now climbing up ladders to arrange curtain-rods, now descending to the cellars in search of unknown and nameless requisites. A shrewd observer might have wondered that such extensive changes in the economy of a household were effected for the sake of one night’s accommodation; but this thought neither occurred to Dalton nor his daughter, who were, indeed, too full of admiration for their guests’ ingenuity and readiness, to think of anything else.

As for honest Peter, a house full of company was his delight. As he took his place that evening at the supper-table, he was supremely happy. Nor was it wonderful, considering the pleased looks and bland faces that he saw on each side of him. All his stories were new to his present audience. Mount Dalton and its doings were an anecdotic mine, of which they had never explored a single “shaft.” The grandeur of his family was a theme all listened to with interest and respect; and as Mrs. Ricketts’s flattery was well-timed and cleverly administered, and Scroope’s blunders fewer and less impertinent than usual, the evening was altogether a very pleasant one, and, as the cant is, went off admirably.

If Nelly had now and then little misgivings about the over-anxiety to please displayed by Mrs. Ricketts, and a certain exaggerated appreciation she occasionally bestowed upon her father’s “Irishism,” she was far too distrustful of her own judgment not to set down her fears to ignorance of life and its conventionalities. “It would ill become her,” she thought, “to criticise people so well-bred and so well-mannered.” And this modest depreciation of herself saved the others.

It was thus that the hosts felt towards their guests as they wished them good-night, and cordially shook hands at parting.

“As agreeable an old lady as ever I met,” said Dalton to his daughter; “and not wanting in good sense either.”

“I like Miss Martha greatly,” said Nelly. “She is so gently mannered and so mild, I’m sure Kate was fond of her.”

“I like them all but the little chap with the stutter. He seems so curious about everything.”

“They are all so pleased – so satisfied with everything,” said Nelly, enthusiastically.

“And why wouldn’t they? There’s worse quarters, let me tell you, than this! It is n’t under Peter Dalton’s roof that people go to bed hungry. I wouldn’t wonder if they’d pass a day or two with us.”

“Do you think so?” said Nelly, scarcely knowing whether to be pleased or the reverse.

“Well see to-morrow,” said Dalton, as he took his candle and began to climb up the stairs to the room which he was now to occupy instead of his own chamber, singing, as he went, an old ballad, —

Leaving Dalton to con over the stray verses of his once favorite ballad as he dropped off to sleep, we turn for a moment to the chamber which, by right of conquest, was held by the fair Zoe, and where, before a large mirror, she was now seated; while Martha was engaged upon that wonderful head, whose external machinery was almost as complex as its internal. Mrs. Ricketts had resolved upon adopting a kind of materno-protective tone towards Nelly; and the difficulty now was to hit off a coiffure to sustain that new character. It should combine the bland with the dignified, and be simple without being severe. There was something Memnonic in that large old head, from which the gray hair descended in massive falls, that seemed worthy of better things than a life of petty schemes and small intrigues; and the patient Martha looked like one whose submissive nature should have been bent to less ignoble burdens than the capricious fretfulness of a tiresome old woman. But so is it every day in life; qualities are but what circumstances make them, and even great gifts become but sorry aids when put to base uses!

There was another figure in the group, and for him no regrets arise as to talents misapplied and tastes perverted. Nature had created Scroope Purvis for one line of character, and he never ventured to walk out of it. In a large and showy dressing-gown belonging to his host, and a pair of most capacious slippers from the same wardrobe, Scroope had come down to assist at a Cabinet Council. He had just performed a voyage of discovery round the house, having visited every available nook, from the garret to the cellars, and not omitting the narrow chamber to which Nelly herself had retired, with whom he kept up an amicable conversation for several minutes, under pretence of having mistaken his room. Thence he had paid a visit to old Andy’s den; and, after a close scrutiny of the larder and a peep between the bars at the dairy, came back with the honest conviction that he had done his duty.

“It’s sm-small, sister – it’s very small,” said he, entering her chamber.

“It’s not smaller than Mrs. Balfour’s cottage at the Lakes, and you know we spent a summer there,” said the lady, rebukingly.

“But we had it all to – to ourselves, sister.”

“So much the worse. A cook and a cellar are admirable fixtures. – The curls lower down on the sides, Martha. I don’t want to look like Grisi.” There was something comforting in the last assurance, for it would have sorely tested poor Martha’s skill had the wish been the reverse.

“They don’t seem to ha-have been long here, sister. The knif eboard in the scullery has n’t been used above a – a few times. I should n’t wonder if old Da-Da-Dalton won the villa at play.”

“Fudge! – Fuller on the brow, Martha – more expansive there.”

“Is n’t the girl vulgar, sister?” asked Scroope.

“Decidedly vulgar, and dressed like a fright! – I thought it was only you, Martha, that rolled up the back hair like a snail’s shell.” Martha blushed, but never spoke. “I suppose she’s the same that used to cut the pipe-heads and the umbrella tops. I remarked that her fingers were all knotted and hard.”

“Her smile is very pleasing,” submitted Martha, diffidently.

“It’s like her father’s laugh, – far too natural for my taste! There’s no refinement, no elegance, in one of your sweet, unmeaning smiles. I thought I had told you that at least twenty times, Martha. But you have grown self-willed and self-opinionated of late, and I must say, you couldn’t have a graver fault! Correct it in time, I beseech you.”

“I ‘ll try,” said Martha, in a very faint voice.

“If you try, you ‘ll succeed. Look at your brother. See what he has become. There’s an example might stimulate you.”

Another and a far deeper sigh was all Martha’s acknowledgment of this speech.

“He was the same violent, impetuous creature that you are. There, you need n’t tear my hair out by the roots to prove it! He wouldn’t brook the very mildest remonstrance; he was passionate and irrestrainable, and what I have made him. Oh, you spiteful creature, how you hurt me!”

This cry of pain was not quite causeless, for Martha was trembling from head to foot, and actually only saved herself from falling by a mechanical clutch at something like a horse’s tail. With many excuses, and in a voice broken by regrets, she resumed her task with a vigorous effort for success, while Mrs. Ricketts and Purvis exchanged glances of supreme contempt.

“I speak to you, Martha,” resumed she, “for your own sake. You cannot see what all the world sees, – the sinful selfishness of your nature, – a vice, I must say, the less pardonable that you live beneath the shadow of my counsels! – Scroope, don’t creak that chair, – sit upon that stool there. – Now that we shall probably spend two months here – ”

“Here! Do – do you m-mean here?” cried Purvis.

“Of course I mean here, sir. There’s nothing in the shape of a lodging to be had under three or four hundred francs a month. This is a very sweet place; and when the old gentleman can be induced to take a room in the town for himself, and that his daughter learns, as she will, – though certainly not from Martha, – what is due to me, it will be comfortable and convenient. We’ll ask the Princess, too, to spend a week with us; for who knows, in the present state of politics, to what corner of Germany we may yet be reduced to fly!”

“How will you m-m-manage with Haggerstone and the rest, when they arrive, sister?”

“Easily enough. I ‘ll show them that it’s for their advantage that we are here. It is true that we agreed to take a house together; but every plan is modified by the events of the campaign. Petrolaffsky will be content if Mr. Dalton plays piquet; the Colonel will like his claret and Burgundy; and Foglass will be pleased with the retirement that permits him to prosecute his attentions to Martha.”

Poor Martha blushed crimson at the tone rather, even than the words of the speech; for, when nothing else offered, it was the practice of Mrs. Ricketts to insinuate coquetry as among her sister’s defects.

“You needn’t look so much confused, my dear,” resumed the torturer; “I ‘m certain it’s not the first affair of the kind you’ve known.”

“Oh, sister!” cried Martha, in a voice of almost entreaty.

“Not that I think there would be anything unsuitable in the match; he is probably fifty-eight or nine, – sixty at most, – and, excepting deafness and the prosy tendency natural to his time of life, pretty much like everybody else.”

“You know, sister, that he never thought of me, nor I of him.”

“I know that I am not in the confidence of either party,” said Mrs. Ricketts, bridling; “and I also know I am sincerely happy that my head is not crammed with such fiddle-faddle. Before the great event comes off, however, you will have time to attend to something else, and therefore I beg you will keep in mind what I am about to say to you. We are here, Martha,” resumed she, with all the solemnity of a judicial charge, – “we are here by no claims of relationship or previous friendship. No secret ties of congenial tastes bind us up together. No common attachment to some other dear creature forms a link between us. We are here as much by chance as one can venture to call anything in this unhappy world. Let us, then, show Fortune that we are not unworthy of her goodness, by neglecting nothing which may strengthen our position and secure our permanence. In a word, Martha, throw over all your selfishness’ – forget the miserable egotism that besets you, and study that young girl’s character and wishes. She has never been courted in life – flatter her; she has never been even thought of – show her every consideration; she is evidently of a thoughtful turn, and nobody can mope better than yourself. Insinuate yourself day by day into little household affairs, mingling counsels here and warnings there, – always on the side of economy, – so that while affecting only to play with the reins, you’ll end by driving the coach.”