CHAPTER IV.
While Leonard accustoms himself gradually to the splendours that surround
him, and often turns with a sigh to the remembrance of his mother's
cottage and the sparkling fount in the Italian's flowery garden, we will
make with thee, O reader, a rapid flight to the metropolis, and drop
ourselves amidst the gay groups that loiter along the dusty ground or
loll over the roadside palings of Hyde Park. The season is still at its
height; but the short day of fashionable London life, which commences two
hours after noon, is in its decline.
The crowd in Rotten Row begins to thin. Near the statue of Achilles, and
apart from all other loungers, a gentleman, with one hand thrust into his
waistcoat, and the other resting on his cane, gazed listlessly on the
horsemen and carriages in the brilliant ring. He was still in the prime
of life, at the age when man is usually the most social,--when the
acquaintances of youth have ripened into friendships, and a personage of
some rank and fortune has become a well-known feature in the mobile face
of society. But though, when his contemporaries were boys scarce at
college, this gentleman had blazed foremost amongst the princes of
fashion, and though he had all the qualities of nature and circumstance
which either retain fashion to the last, or exchange its false celebrity
for a graver repute, he stood as a stranger in that throng of his
countrymen. Beauties whirled by to the toilet, statesmen passed on to
the senate, dandies took flight to the clubs; and neither nods, nor
becks, nor wreathed smiles said to the solitary spectator, "Follow us,--
thou art one of our set." Now and then some middle-aged beau, nearing
the post of the loiterer, turned round to look again; but the second
glance seemed to dissipate the recognition of the first, and the beau
silently continued his way.
"By the tomb of my fathers!" said the solitary to himself, "I know now
what a dead man might feel if he came to life again, and took a peep at
the living."
Time passed on,--the evening shades descended fast. Our stranger in
London had well-nigh the Park to himself. He seemed to breathe more
freely as he saw that the space was so clear.
"There's oxygen in the atmosphere now," said he, half aloud; "and I can
walk without breathing in the gaseous fumes of the multitude. Oh, those
chemists--what dolts they are! They tell us that crowds taint the air,
but they never guess why! Pah, it is not the lungs that poison the
element,--it is the reek of bad hearts. When a periwigpated fellow
breathes on me, I swallow a mouthful of care. Allons! my friend Nero;
now for a stroll." He touched with his cane a large Newfoundland dog,
who lay stretched near his feet, and dog and man went slow through the
growing twilight, and over the brown dry turf. At length our solitary
paused, and threw himself on a bench under a tree. "Half-past eight!"
said he, looking at his watch, "one may smoke one's cigar without
shocking the world."
He took out his cigar-case, struck a light, and in another moment
reclined at length on the bench, seemed absorbed in regarding the smoke,
that scarce coloured ere it vanished into air.
"It is the most barefaced lie in the world, my Nero," said he, addressing
his dog, "this boasted liberty of man! Now, here am I, a free-born
Englishman, a citizen of the world, caring--I often say to myself--caring
not a jot for Kaiser or Mob; and yet I no more dare smoke this cigar in
the Park at half-past six, when all the world is abroad, than I dare pick
my Lord Chancellor's pocket, or hit the Archbishop of Canterbury a thump
on the nose. Yet no law in England forbids me my cigar, Nero! What is
law at half-past eight was not crime at six and a half! Britannia says,
'Man, thou art free, and she lies like a commonplace woman. O Nero,
Nero! you enviable dog! you serve but from liking. No thought of the
world costs you one wag of the tail. Your big heart and true instinct
suffice you for reason and law. You would want nothing to your felicity,
if in these moments of ennui you would but smoke a cigar. Try it, Nero!
--try it!" And, rising from his incumbent posture, he sought to force
the end of the weed between the teeth of the dog.
While thus gravely engaged, two figures had approached the place. The
one was a man who seemed weak and sickly. His threadbare coat was
buttoned to the chin, but hung large on his shrunken breast. The other
was a girl, who might be from twelve to fourteen, on whose arm he leaned
heavily. Her cheek was wan, and there was a patient, sad look on her
face, which seemed so settled that you would think she could never have
known the mirthfulness of childhood.
"Pray rest here, Papa," said the child, softly; and she pointed to the
bench, without taking heed of its pre-occupant, who now, indeed, confined
to one corner of the seat, was almost hidden by the shadow of the tree.
The man sat down, with a feeble sigh, and then, observing the stranger,
raised his hat, and said, in that tone of voice which betrays the usages
of polished society, "Forgive me if I intrude on you, sir."
The stranger looked up from his dog, and seeing that the girl was
standing, rose at once, as if to make room for her on the bench.
But still the girl did not heed him. She hung over her father, and wiped
his brow tenderly with a little kerchief which she took from her own neck
for the purpose.
Nero, delighted to escape the cigar, had taken to some unwieldy curvets
and gambols, to vent the excitement into which he had been thrown; and
now returning, approached the bench with a low growl of surprise, and
sniffed at the intruders of his master's privacy.
"Come here, sir," said the master. "You need not fear him," he added,
addressing himself to the girl.
But the girl, without turning round to him, cried in a voice rather of
anguish than alarm, "He has fainted! Father! Father!"
The stranger kicked aside his dog, which was in the way, and loosened the
poor man's stiff military stock. While thus charitably engaged, the moon
broke out, and the light fell full on the pale, careworn face of the
unconscious sufferer.
"This face seems not unfamiliar to me, though sadly changed," said the
stranger to himself; and bending towards the girl, who had sunk on her
knees, and was chafing her father's hand, he asked, "My child, what is
your father's name?"
The child continued her task, too absorbed to answer.
The stranger put his hand on her shoulder, and repeated the question.
"Digby," answered the child, almost unconsciously; and as she spoke the
man's senses began to return. In a few minutes more he had sufficiently
recovered to falter forth his thanks to the stranger. But the last took
his hand, and said, in a voice at once tremulous and soothing, "Is it
possible that I see once more an old brother in arms? Algernon Digby, I
do not forget you; but it seems England has forgotten."
A hectic flush spread over the soldier's face, and he looked away from
the speaker as he answered,--
"My name is Digby, it is true, sir; but I do not think we have met
before. Come, Helen, I am well now,--we will go home."
"Try and play with that great dog, my child," said the stranger,--"I want
to talk with your father."
The child bowed her submissive head, and moved away; but she did not play
with the dog.
"I must reintroduce myself formally, I see," quoth the stranger. "You
were in the same regiment with myself, and my name is L'Estrange."
"My Lord," said the soldier, rising, "forgive me that--"
"I don't think that it was the fashion to call me 'my lord' at the mess-
table. Come, what has happened to you?--on half-pay?"
Mr. Digby shook his head mournfully.
"Digby, old fellow, can you lend me L100?" said Lord L'Estrange, clapping
his ci-devant brother-officer on the shoulder, and in a tone of voice
that seemed like a boy's, so impudent was it, and devil-me-Garish. "No!
Well, that's lucky, for I can lend it to you." Mr. Digby burst into
tears.
Lord L'Estrange did not seem to observe the emotion, but went on
carelessly,--
"Perhaps you don't know that, besides being heir to a father who is not
only very rich, but very liberal, I inherited, on coming of age, from a
maternal relation, a fortune so large that it would bore me to death if I
were obliged to live up to it. But in the days of our old acquaintance,
I fear we were both sad extravagant fellows, and I dare say I borrowed of
you pretty freely."
"Me! Oh, Lord L'Estrange!"
"You have married since then, and reformed, I suppose. Tell me, old
friend, all about it."
Mr. Digby, who by this time had succeeded in restoring some calm to his
shattered nerves, now rose, and said in brief sentences, but clear, firm
tones,--
"My Lord, it is idle to talk of me,--useless to help me. I am fast
dying. But my child there, my only child" (he paused for an instant, and
went on rapidly). "I have relations in a distant county, if I could but
get to them; I think they would, at least, provide for her. This has
been for weeks my hope, my dream, my prayer. I cannot afford the journey
except by your help. I have begged without shame for myself; shall I be
ashamed, then, to beg for her?"
"Digby," said L'Estrange, with some grave alteration of manner, "talk
neither of dying nor begging. You were nearer death when the balls
whistled round you at Waterloo. If soldier meets soldier and says
'Friend, thy purse,' it is not begging, but brotherhood. Ashamed! By
the soul of Belisarius! if I needed money, I would stand at a crossing
with my Waterloo medal over my breast, and say to each sleek citizen I
had helped to save from the sword of the Frenchman, 'It is your shame if
I starve.' Now, lean upon me; I see you should be at home: which way?"
The poor soldier pointed his hand towards Oxford Street, and reluctantly
accepted the proffered arm.
"And when you return from your relations, you will call on me? What--
hesitate? Come, promise."
"I will."
"On your honour."
"If I live, on my honour."
"I am staying at present at Knightsbridge, with my father; but you will
always hear of my address at No.--, Grosvenor Square, Mr. Egerton's. So
you have a long journey before you?"
"Very long."
"Do not fatigue yourself,--travel slowly. Ho, you foolish child! I see
you are jealous of me. Your father has another arm to spare you."
Thus talking, and getting but short answers, Lord L'Estrange continued to
exhibit those whimsical peculiarities of character, which had obtained
for him the repute of heartlessness in the world. Perhaps the reader may
think the world was not in the right; but if ever the world does judge
rightly of the character of a man who does not live for the world nor
talk of the world nor feel with the world, it will be centuries after the
soul of Harley L'Estrange has done with this planet.
