The Long Vacation

Chapter XXV. Desdichado

'Perish wealth and power and pride,
   Mortal boons by mortals given;
 But let constancy abide--
   Constancy's the gift of Heaven.--SCOTT.

Lancelot and Gerald did not obtain much by their journey to London. Gerald wanted to begin with Mr. Bast, van proprietor, but Lance insisted on having the lawyer's counsel first, and the advice amounted to exhortations not to commit themselves, or to make offers such as to excite cupidity, especially in the matter of Ludmilla, but to dwell on the fact of her being so close to the age of emancipation, and the illegality of tyrannical training.

This, however, proved to be wasted advice. Mr. Bast was impervious. He undertook to forward a letter to Mr. O'Leary, but would not tell where, nor whether wife and daughter were with him. The letter was written, and in due time was answered, but with an intimation that the information desired could only be given upon the terms already mentioned; and refusing all transactions respecting the young lady mentioned, who was with her natural guardians and in no need of intervention.

They were baffled at all points, and the lawyer did not encourage any idea of holding out a lure for information, which might easily be trumped up. Since Lancelot had discovered so much as that the first marriage had taken place at Messina, and the desertion at Trieste, as well as that the husband was said to have been a native of Piedmont, he much recommended personal investigation at all these points, especially as Mr. Underwood could obtain the assistance and interest of consuls. It was likely that if neither uncle nor nephew made further demonstration, the O'Learys would attempt further communication, which he and Lance could follow up. This might be a clue to finding "the young lady"--to him a secondary matter, to Gerald a vital one, but for the present nothing could be done for her, poor child.

So they could only return to Rockquay to make immediate preparations for the journey. Matters were simplified by Miss Mohun, who, hearing that Clement's doctors ordered him abroad for the winter, came to the rescue, saying that she should miss Fergus and his lessons greatly, and she thought it would be a pity for Mrs. Edgar to lose their little baronet, just after having given offence to certain inhabitants by a modified expulsion of Campbell and Horner, and therefore volunteering to take Adrian for a few terms, look after his health, his morals, and his lessons, and treat him in fact like a nephew, "to keep her hand in," she said, "till the infants began to appear from India."

This was gratefully accepted, and Alda liked the plan better than placing him at Bexley, which she continued to regard as an unwholesome place. The proposal to take Franceska was likewise welcome, and the damsel herself was in transports of delight. Various arrangements had to be made, and it was far on in August that the farewells were exchanged with Clipstone and Beechcroft Cottage, where each member of the party felt that a real friend had been acquired. The elders, ladies who had grown up in an enthusiastic age, were even more devoted to one another than were Anna and Mysie. Gillian stood a little aloof, resolved against "foolish" confidences, and devoting herself to studies for college life, in which she tried to swallow up all the feelings excited by those ship letters.

Dolores had her secret, which was to be no longer a secret when she had heard from her father, and in the meantime, with Gerald's full concurrence, she was about to work hard to qualify herself for lecturing or giving lessons on physical science. She could not enter the college that she wished for till the winter term, and meant to spend the autumn in severe study.

"We will work," was the substance of those last words between them, and their parting tokens were characteristic, each giving the other a little case of mathematical instruments, "We will work, and we will hope."

"And what for?" said Dolores.

"I should say for toil, if it could be with untarnished name," said Gerald.

"Name and fame are our own to make," said Dolores, with sparkling eyes.

This was their parting. Indeed they expected to meet at Christmas or before it, so soon as Mr. Maurice Mohun should have written. Gerald was, by the unanimous wish of his uncles, to finish his terms at Oxford. Whatever might be his fate, a degree would help him in life.

He had accepted the decision, though he had rather have employed the time in a restless search for his mother and sister; but after vainly pursuing two or three entertainments at fairs, he became amenable to the conviction that they were more likely to hear something if they gave up the search and kept quiet, and both Dolores and Mrs. Henderson promised to be on the watch.

The state of suspense proved an admirable tonic to the whole being of the young man. His listlessness had departed, and he did everything with an energy he had never shown before. Only nothing would induce him to go near Vale Leston, and he made it understood that his twenty-first birthday was to be unnoticed. Not a word passed between Gerald and his aunt as to the cause of the journey, and the doubt that hung over him, but nothing could be more assiduous and tender than his whole conduct to her and his uncle throughout the journey, as though he had no object in life but to save them trouble and make them comfortable.

The party started in August, travelled very slowly, and he was the kindest squire to the two girls, taking them to see everything, and being altogether, as Geraldine said, the most admirable courier in the world, with a wonderful intuition as to what she individually would like to see, and how she could see it without fatigue. Moreover, on the Sunday that occurred at a little German town, it was the greatest joy to her that he sought no outside gaiety, but rather seemed to cling to his uncle's home ministrations, and even to her readings of hymns. They had a quiet walk together, and it was a day of peace when his gentle kindness put her in mind of his father, yet with a regretful depth she had always missed in Edgar.

Nor was there any of that old dreary, half-contemptuous tone and manner which had often made her think he was only conforming to please her, and shrinking from coming to close quarters, where he might confess opinions that would grieve her. He was manifestly in earnest, listening and joining in the services as if they had a new force to him. Perhaps they had the more from the very absence of the ordinary externals, and with nothing to disturb the individual personality of Clement's low, earnest, and reverent tones. There were tears on his eyelashes as he rose up, bent over, and kissed his Cherie. And that evening, while Clement and the two nieces walked farther, and listened to the Benediction in the little Austrian church, Gerald sat under a linden-tree with his aunt, and in the fullness of his heart told her how things stood between him and Dolores.

Geraldine had never been as much attracted by Dolores as by Gillian and Mysie, but she was greatly touched by hearing that the meeting and opening of affection had been on the discovery that Gerald was probably nameless and landless, and that the maiden was bent on casting in her lot with him whatever his fate might be.

He murmured to himself the old lines, with a slight alteration--

          "I could not love thee, dear, so much,
             Loved I not justice more."

"Yes, indeed, Cherie, our affection is a very different and better thing than it would be if I were only the rich young squire sure of my position."

"I am sure it is, my dear. I honour and love her for being my boy's brave comforter--comforter in the true sense. I see now what has helped you to be so brave and cheery. But what will her father say?"

"He will probably be startled, and--and will object, but it would be a matter of waiting anyway, the patience that the Vicar preaches, and we have made up our minds. I'll fight my own way; she to prepare by her Cambridge course to come and work with me, as we can do so much better among the people--among them in reality, and by no pretence."

"Ah! don't speak as if you gave up your cause."

"Well, I won't, if you don't like to hear it, Cherie," he said, smiling; "but anyway you will be good to Dolores."

"Indeed I will do my best, my dear. I am sure you and she, whatever happens, have the earnest purpose and soul to do all the good you can, whether from above or on the same level, and that makes the oneness of love."

"Thank you, Cherie carissima. You see the secret of our true bond."

"One bond to make it deeper must be there. The love of God beneath the love of man."