Lost Sir Massingberd: A Romance of Real Life. v. 1/2 Page 3

  CHAPTER II.

  MY FIRST INTERVIEW.

  My own history has little or nothing to do with the present narrative,and therefore I will not allude to it, except where it is absolutelynecessary. Suffice it to say, that my parents were in India, and thatfor many years Fairburn Rectory was my home. I had no vacations, in thesense that the word is generally understood to mean; I had nowhere elseto go to, nor did I wish to go anywhere. No father could have beenkinder, or have done his duty better by me, than did Mr. Long. How poorMarmaduke used to envy me my wardship to that good man! I well rememberthe first day I came to Fairburn. It was early summer; its great woodswere in all their glory; and to me, fresh from shipboard and the vastwaste of sea, the place seemed a bower of bliss. First, the grey oldchurch tower upon the hill; and then the turrets of the Hall,half-hidden in oak; and last, the low-roofed, blossom-entangled cottagewhere I found so bright a welcome--that was the order in which Fairburnwas introduced to visitors from town. The Church, and the Hall, and theRectory all lay together; the churchyard, dark with yews, encroachedupon the Rectory garden; and that bright spot, so trimly kept, that onewas moved to pick up a fallen leaf, if such were on its lawn, slopeddown into the heart of the Park. A light iron railing, with wires toprevent the hares and rabbits from entering in and nibbling the flowers,alone divided the great man's land from Mr. Long's trim demesne. Thedeer came up and pushed their velvet horns against it. In copse andfern, twinkled the innumerable ear and tail. I had never seen suchanimals before, and they delighted me hugely. After dinner, on the veryday that I arrived, I fed them through the rails, and they ate the breadfrom my open hand.

  "They take you for Marmaduke," said Mr. Long, smiling; "for otherwise,they would be shy of a stranger."

  "And who is Marmaduke, sir?"

  "He is your fellow pupil, and I make no doubt will be your friend. Iwish that he was resident with me, like yourself; but his uncle, wholives at the Hall yonder, will not part with him. He reads with memorning and afternoon, however."

  "Does he like reading, sir?" inquired I with hesitation, for I for mypart did not. My education, such as it was, had been fitful incomplete,and in a word, Indian; and I had come back much older than most Europeanboys have to come home, a sad dunce.

  "Yes, Marmaduke is very fond of reading," pursued my tutor; "that is,reading of a certain sort. He always does his work well with me, so Imust not be hard on him; but he is certainly too fond of novels. Andyonder he comes, see, with a book in his hand, even as he walks." Mytutor pointed to the Park; and there, coming slowly down a long, broad"ride," with his eyes fixed upon a volume he held in his hand, was ayouth of seventeen years old or so, which was about my own age. As hecame nearer, I began to see why the deer had mistaken me for him; not,indeed, because he was very handsome (which was not at all the case withme), but inasmuch as his complexion was as olive as my own.

  "Why, he has been to India too!" whispered I to my tutor, ratherdisappointed than otherwise, for I had had enough of Indian playmates,and to spare.

  "No," returned he in the same low voice; "his mother was an Italian."

  Then he introduced us; and I began to hang my head, and play with thebuttons of my waistcoat, as is the graceful manner of hobbledehoys uponsuch a ceremony; but Marmaduke, completely self-possessed, asked aboutmy journey, and particularly what I had seen at sea. He knew so muchabout sharks and porpoises, that I thought he must have made some longvoyage himself; but he told me that such was not the case.

  "Though I should like to go to sea of all things," said he; "and I wouldcruise about that cape--what's its name?--until I met with the "FlyingDutchman:" that is the vessel which I wish to see."

  "I have never heard of her," said I, proud of that nautical use of thefeminine. "Is she one of the Company's ships?"

  At this my tutor began to rub his hands, and chuckle inwardly, as washis wont when vastly amused; but perceiving that the colour came into mycheeks, he laid his hand upon my shoulder kindly, and said that he wasglad to find my head, at least, was not stuck full of foolish stories,as some people's heads were; while Marmaduke, without triumphing in theleast over my ignorance, explained to me all about that Phantom Ship,which glides full sail upon the astonished voyager, and passes throughhis vessel without shock or noise. He told the tale exactly as if he hadheard it straight from the lips of an eye-witness, and believed ithimself; he never laughed, and if he smiled, he seemed to be sorry thathe had done so directly afterwards. Some melancholy thought appeared tooccupy his mind at all times; and if a bright fancy crossed it, it wasbut for an instant, like lightning through the cloud. I am notdescribing an "interesting" youth, after the manner of romance-writers;no "secret sorrow" obscured the young existence of Marmaduke Heath, butsimply, as I subsequently discovered, vulgar, abject terror. His wholebeing was oppressed by reason of one man. The shadow of Sir Massingberdcast itself over him alike when he went out from his hated presence andwhen he was about to return to it. He was never free from its nightmareinfluence--never. His passion for reading was not so much a love ofbooks, as a desire to escape in them from the circumstances of hisactual life. If he ever forgot him in earnest talk--and he was the mostearnest talker, as a boy, I ever knew--the mention of his uncle's namewas a Medusa's Head to turn him into stony silence on the instant. IfMarmaduke Heath could only have got away from Fairburn Hall when I firstknew him, his mind might have regained its natural vigour andelasticity; but as it was, it grew more sombre and morbid every day. Hishungry intellect was nourished upon what associations happened to be athand, and they were very unhealthy food. The wickedness of SirMassingberd was, of course, sufficiently present to him, like somehateful picture hung at a bed's foot, which the eyes of a sleepless mancannot avoid; while every tongue about the Hall was ready to tell him ofthe evil deeds of his forefathers. At first, I thought my young friend'sconstant allusion to his family was the result of aristocratic pride,although, indeed, there was nothing to be proud of in what he told me,but very much the reverse; but I soon found that this was not the case.The history of the Heaths was what interested him most of all histories,and he favoured me with extracts from it solely upon that account. Asfor the fact of their noble blood running in his own veins, he would, Iam confident, have far rather been the son of Mrs. Myrtle, the kind oldhousekeeper at the Rectory.

  "We are a doomed race, Peter," he once said to me, not long after we hadmade friendship with one another. "Generation after generation of ushave sinned and sinned. The Corsicans have their family feudstransmitted to them, but they are hostile only to their fellow men; theHeaths have ever fought against Heaven itself. Each successor to thetitle seems to have said, like the descendants of Tubal Cain--

  'We will not hear, we will not know, The God that was our father's foe.'

  There is the Church," said he, pointing to that glorious pile, which, atFairburn, was almost a cathedral in magnitude and beauty, "and there isthe Hall. They are antagonistic; they are devoted to opposite purposes.I tell you, yes; our family residence is consecrated to the devil."

  I am afraid I could not help laughing at this singular notion.

  "Nay," cried he, looking round him furtively, "but you shall see that itis so." We were in the Rectory garden, which communicated with thechurchyard by a wicket. He led the way into it; and in a distant corner,upon the north side of the chancel, he showed me a sombreburying-ground, separated from the rest of the God's acre, andimprisoned in dark purgatorial rails. "Do you know why we are all putthere," asked he, "instead of with the other--Christian--folks?"

  "You are too proud to lie with the poor, perhaps," returned I, who hadstill that idea in my mind with regard to Marmaduke himself.

  "No," said he; "it is not that--it is because the Heaths will not beburied in consecrated ground."

  "But you have a family vault underneath the chancel, have you not?"

  "Yes; but it is not 'snug lying.' None of us have been put there sinceold Sir Hugh, in Queen Anne's time. When they opened the vault for him,th
ey found his father's coffin with its plate to the ground. It hadturned over. The witty parson would have it that it was only naturalthat it should have done so, since its tenant, during life, had foughtalternately for Parliament and King, and was addicted to changingsides. Bat when Sir Hugh's successor demanded lodging in the place inhis turn, they found Sir Hugh's coffin had turned over likewise. Thecircumstance so terrified the dead man's heir--who had not been on thebest terms with him during life, and perhaps thought he owed him someamends--that he swore his father should not lie in such restlesscompany; and as the late baronet had been at feud with the then rector,he determined to dispense with any assistance from the church at all,and buried him in an adjoining field, which was subsequently made thelast resting-place of all our race, as you perceive. The burial serviceis dispensed with, of course. It would be mere mockery to address suchwords as Hope and Faith to the corpse of a Heath of Fairburn."

  "My dear Marmaduke," said I, "you make my very blood run cold. Butsurely you exaggerate these things. Some of your people have beenCatholics, and been buried in their own chapel at the Hall, have theynot?"

  "Only one of them," replied the boy with bitterness. "Mygreat-grandfather, Sir Nicholas, abjured his infidelity, and became apapist, in order to secure his bride. He turned the chapel into abanqueting-hall, however, and used the sacramental plate in his unholyrevels; but after death, the priests got hold of him at last, and 'Nickthe Younger,' as he was called, now lies under the altar which he sooften profaned. The beginning of his funeral ceremonies was notconducted so decently as the last rites. He had got outlawed, I believe,or, at all events, was driven abroad in his latter days, and died there.Nobody at Fairburn had heard of him for many months, when one Octobernight, as Oliver Bradford, who is now the head-keeper, but was then avery young man, was watching in the home-preserves, he heard a terriblenoise in the high-road, and making his way out, came upon thisspectacle: two men in black, and upon black horses, rode by him at fullspeed, and close behind them came a hearse-and-four, likewise at thegallop. The plumes upon it waved backwards, he says, like corn, and allthe black trappings of the thing fluttered and flapped as it went by.Another man on horseback, singing to himself a drunken song, closed thishorrid procession. It moved up towards the village, and Oliver listenedto it until the noise seemed to cease about opposite to the Park gates.The solitary witness, frightened enough before, was now doublyterrified, for he made sure that what he had seen was the news of SirNicholas's decease, brought over in this ghastly and characteristicfashion. He did not for a single moment imagine that it was a palpablevision; and yet he had seen a veritable funeral pass by. The old baronethad died in France, leaving directions, and the money to carry them out,that his corpse should be taken at night, and at full gallop, throughevery town that lay between Dover and Fairburn.--Alive or dead," addedMarmaduke grimly, "the Heaths are a charming family."

  "At all events, my dear fellow," said I, laying my hand upon his arm,"you will have nothing to fear from comparison with your forefathers.You may make a good reputation at a cheap price.[1] A very littlevirtue will go a great way with the next tenant of Fairburn Hall, ifhalf the tales we hear be true."

  "And what tales are those?" inquired a deep, low voice at my very elbow.

  I believe I jumped a foot or two in the air myself, so great was myalarm. But as far my companion, if those grass-grown tombs which we werecontemplating had given up their wicked skeletons before his eyes, hecould not have exhibited a greater excess of terror.

  Beside me stood a man of Herculean proportions, who by his dress mighthave been taken for an under-gamekeeper, but for a very massive goldchain which hung from the top button-hole of his waistcoat down to itsdeep-flapped pocket. What is now, I believe, called an "Albert guard,"resembles it on a smaller scale; but at the time I speak of, such anornament was altogether unique. His face, too, evidently belonged to onewho was used to command. On the forehead was a curious indented curvelike the letter U, while his lip curled contemptuously upwards also, insomewhat the same shape. The two together gave him a weird and indeed ademoniacal look, which his white beard, although long and flowing, hadnot enough of dignity to do away with. I had never heard SirMassingberd's personal appearance described; but even if I had not hadbefore me his shrinking nephew, I should have recognized at once thefeatures of Giant Despair.

  "And what tales are those which are told against the present tenant ofFairburn Hall?" reiterated the baronet, scanning me from head to footwith his cold glittering eyes. "And who is this young gentleman whocomes to listen to them from the lips of my loving ward?"

  "Sir," said I, "your nephew was saying nothing whatever against you, Ido assure you. I was merely referring to the gossip of the village,which, indeed, does not make you out to be entirely a saint." I wasangry at having been frightened by this man, who, after all, could nothurt me. I had been accustomed, too, to Indian life; which, withoutmaking one bolder than other people, indisposes one to submit todictation, which is only the duty of the natives.

  Sir Massingberd reached forth one iron finger, and rocked me with it toand fro, though I stood as firm as I could. "Take care, young gentleman,take care," said he; "that spirit of yours will not do down at Fairburn.Mr. Long does not seem to have taught you humility, I think. Marmaduke,go home." He spoke these last words exactly as a man speaks to his dogwho has injudiciously followed him to church on Sunday, in the hope thathe was bent on partridge shooting.

  The boy instantly obeyed. He shrank away, passing as closely to thechurchyard railing as he could, as though he almost feared a blow fromhis uncle.

  "There is humility, there is docility!" sneered the baronet, lookingafter him. "And if I had you up at the Hall, my young bantam, for fourand twenty hours or so, I'd make you docile too." He strode away with alaugh like the creaking of an iron hinge, for he saw that I did not dareto answer him. He strode away over the humble graves, setting his footdeep into their daisied mounds as though in scorn; and his laugh echoedagain and again from the sepulchral walls, for it was joy to SirMassingberd Heath to know that he was feared.

  [1] I am told by an able friend, who is good enough to revise for methis manuscript, that it is not likely that a mere boy, as I then was,would have made such an observation as the above. I do not doubt thatthis remark is altogether just; but I am afraid it will apply to so muchelse in this narrative, that it is scarcely worth while to make analteration. I am not used to literary composition; I cannot weighwhether this or that is characteristic of a speaker. I am merely agarrulous person, who has, however, such a striking story to tell, thatI trust the matter will atone for the manner.