My Lady Ludlow (29 page)

And Mr. Horner was dead, and Captain James reigned in his stead. Good,
steady, severe, silent Mr. Horner! with his clock-like regularity, and
his snuff-coloured clothes, and silver buckles! I have often wondered
which one misses most when they are dead and gone,—the bright creatures
full of life, who are hither and thither and everywhere, so that no one
can reckon upon their coming and going, with whom stillness and the long
quiet of the grave, seems utterly irreconcilable, so full are they of
vivid motion and passion,—or the slow, serious people, whose
movements—nay, whose very words, seem to go by clockwork; who never
appear much to affect the course of our life while they are with us, but
whose methodical ways show themselves, when they are gone, to have been
intertwined with our very roots of daily existence. I think I miss these
last the most, although I may have loved the former best. Captain James
never was to me what Mr. Horner was, though the latter had hardly changed
a dozen words with me at the day of his death. Then Miss Galindo! I
remembered the time as if it had been only yesterday, when she was but a
name—and a very odd one—to me; then she was a queer, abrupt,
disagreeable, busy old maid. Now I loved her dearly, and I found out
that I was almost jealous of Miss Bessy.

Mr. Gray I never thought of with love; the feeling was almost reverence
with which I looked upon him. I have not wished to speak much of myself,
or else I could have told you how much he had been to me during these
long, weary years of illness. But he was almost as much to every one,
rich and poor, from my lady down to Miss Galindo's Sally.

The village, too, had a different look about it. I am sure I could not
tell you what caused the change; but there were no more lounging young
men to form a group at the cross-road, at a time of day when young men
ought to be at work. I don't say this was all Mr. Gray's doing, for
there really was so much to do in the fields that there was but little
time for lounging now-a-days. And the children were hushed up in school,
and better behaved out of it, too, than in the days when I used to be
able to go my lady's errands in the village. I went so little about now,
that I am sure I can't tell who Miss Galindo found to scold; and yet she
looked so well and so happy that I think she must have had her accustomed
portion of that wholesome exercise.

Before I left Hanbury, the rumour that Captain James was going to marry
Miss Brooke, Baker Brooke's eldest daughter, who had only a sister to
share his property with her, was confirmed. He himself announced it to
my lady; nay, more, with a courage, gained, I suppose, in his former
profession, where, as I have heard, he had led his ship into many a post
of danger, he asked her ladyship, the Countess Ludlow, if he might bring
his bride elect, (the Baptist baker's daughter!) and present her to my
lady!

I am glad I was not present when he made this request; I should have felt
so much ashamed for him, and I could not have helped being anxious till I
heard my lady's answer, if I had been there. Of course she acceded; but
I can fancy the grave surprise of her look. I wonder if Captain James
noticed it.

I hardly dared ask my lady, after the interview had taken place, what she
thought of the bride elect; but I hinted my curiosity, and she told me,
that if the young person had applied to Mrs. Medlicott, for the situation
of cook, and Mrs. Medlicott had engaged her, she thought that it would
have been a very suitable arrangement. I understood from this how little
she thought a marriage with Captain James, R.N., suitable.

About a year after I left Hanbury, I received a letter from Miss Galindo;
I think I can find it.—Yes, this is it.

'Hanbury, May 4, 1811.

DEAR MARGARET,

'You ask for news of us all. Don't you know there is no news in
Hanbury? Did you ever hear of an event here? Now, if you have
answered "Yes," in your own mind to these questions, you have fallen
into my trap, and never were more mistaken in your life. Hanbury is
full of news; and we have more events on our hands than we know what
to do with. I will take them in the order of the newspapers—births,
deaths, and marriages. In the matter of births, Jenny Lucas has had
twins not a week ago. Sadly too much of a good thing, you'll say.
Very true: but then they died; so their birth did not much signify. My
cat has kittened, too; she has had three kittens, which again you may
observe is too much of a good thing; and so it would be, if it were
not for the next item of intelligence I shall lay before you. Captain
and Mrs. James have taken the old house next Pearson's; and the house
is overrun with mice, which is just as fortunate for me as the King of
Egypt's rat-ridden kingdom was to Dick Whittington. For my cat's
kittening decided me to go and call on the bride, in hopes she wanted
a cat; which she did like a sensible woman, as I do believe she is, in
spite of Baptism, Bakers, Bread, and Birmingham, and something worse
than all, which you shall hear about, if you'll only be patient. As I
had got my best bonnet on, the one I bought when poor Lord Ludlow was
last at Hanbury in '99—I thought it a great condescension in myself
(always remembering the date of the Galindo baronetcy) to go and call
on the bride; though I don't think so much of myself in my every-day
clothes, as you know. But who should I find there but my Lady Ludlow!
She looks as frail and delicate as ever, but is, I think, in better
heart ever since that old city merchant of a Hanbury took it into his
head that he was a cadet of the Hanburys of Hanbury, and left her that
handsome legacy. I'll warrant you that the mortgage was paid off
pretty fast; and Mr. Horner's money—or my lady's money, or Harry
Gregson's money, call it which you will—is invested in his name, all
right and tight; and they do talk of his being captain of his school,
or Grecian, or something, and going to college, after all! Harry
Gregson the poacher's son! Well! to be sure, we are living in strange
times!

'But I have not done with the marriages yet. Captain James's is all
very well, but no one cares for it now, we are so full of Mr. Gray's.
Yes, indeed, Mr. Gray is going to be married, and to nobody else but
my little Bessy! I tell her she will have to nurse him half the days
of her life, he is such a frail little body. But she says she does
not care for that; so that his body holds his soul, it is enough for
her. She has a good spirit and a brave heart, has my Bessy! It is a
great advantage that she won't have to mark her clothes over again:
for when she had knitted herself her last set of stockings, I told her
to put G for Galindo, if she did not choose to put it for Gibson, for
she should be my child if she was no one else's. And now you see it
stands for Gray. So there are two marriages, and what more would you
have? And she promises to take another of my kittens.

'Now, as to deaths, old Farmer Hale is dead—poor old man, I should
think his wife thought it a good riddance, for he beat her every day
that he was drunk, and he was never sober, in spite of Mr. Gray. I
don't think (as I tell him) that Mr. Gray would ever have found
courage to speak to Bessy as long as Farmer Hale lived, he took the
old gentleman's sins so much to heart, and seemed to think it was all
his fault for not being able to make a sinner into a saint. The
parish bull is dead too. I never was so glad in my life. But they
say we are to have a new one in his place. In the meantime I cross
the common in peace, which is very convenient just now, when I have so
often to go to Mr. Gray's to see about furnishing.

'Now you think I have told you all the Hanbury news, don't you? Not
so. The very greatest thing of all is to come. I won't tantalize
you, but just out with it, for you would never guess it. My Lady
Ludlow has given a party, just like any plebeian amongst us. We had
tea and toast in the blue drawing-room, old John Footman waiting with
Tom Diggles, the lad that used to frighten away crows in Farmer Hale's
fields, following in my lady's livery, hair powdered and everything.
Mrs. Medlicott made tea in my lady's own room. My lady looked like a
splendid fairy queen of mature age, in black velvet, and the old lace,
which I have never seen her wear before since my lord's death. But
the company? you'll say. Why, we had the parson of Clover, and the
parson of Headleigh, and the parson of Merribank, and the three
parsonesses; and Farmer Donkin, and two Miss Donkins; and Mr. Gray (of
course), and myself and Bessy; and Captain and Mrs. James; yes, and
Mr. and Mrs. Brooke; think of that! I am not sure the parsons liked
it; but he was there. For he has been helping Captain James to get my
lady's land into order; and then his daughter married the agent; and
Mr. Gray (who ought to know) says that, after all, Baptists are not
such bad people; and he was right against them at one time, as you may
remember. Mrs. Brooke is a rough diamond, to be sure. People have
said that of me, I know. But, being a Galindo, I learnt manners in my
youth and can take them up when I choose. But Mrs. Brooke never
learnt manners, I'll be bound. When John Footman handed her the tray
with the tea-cups, she looked up at him as if she were sorely puzzled
by that way of going on. I was sitting next to her, so I pretended
not to see her perplexity, and put her cream and sugar in for her, and
was all ready to pop it into her hands,—when who should come up, but
that impudent lad Tom Diggles (I call him lad, for all his hair is
powdered, for you know that it is not natural gray hair), with his
tray full of cakes and what not, all as good as Mrs. Medlicott could
make them. By this time, I should tell you, all the parsonesses were
looking at Mrs. Brooke, for she had shown her want of breeding before;
and the parsonesses, who were just a step above her in manners, were
very much inclined to smile at her doings and sayings. Well! what
does she do, but pull out a clean Bandanna pocket-handkerchief all red
and yellow silk, spread it over her best silk gown; it was, like
enough, a new one, for I had it from Sally, who had it from her cousin
Molly, who is dairy-woman at the Brookes', that the Brookes were
mighty set-up with an invitation to drink tea at the Hall. There we
were, Tom Diggles even on the grin (I wonder how long it is since he
was own brother to a scarecrow, only not so decently dressed) and Mrs.
Parsoness of Headleigh,—I forget her name, and it's no matter, for
she's an ill-bred creature, I hope Bessy will behave herself
better—was right-down bursting with laughter, and as near a hee-haw
as ever a donkey was, when what does my lady do? Ay! there's my own
dear Lady Ludlow, God bless her! She takes out her own
pocket-handkerchief, all snowy cambric, and lays it softly down on her
velvet lap, for all the world as if she did it every day of her life,
just like Mrs. Brooke, the baker's wife; and when the one got up to
shake the crumbs into the fire-place, the other did just the same. But
with such a grace! and such a look at us all! Tom Diggles went red
all over; and Mrs. Parsoness of Headleigh scarce spoke for the rest of
the evening; and the tears came into my old silly eyes; and Mr. Gray,
who was before silent and awkward in a way which I tell Bessy she must
cure him of, was made so happy by this pretty action of my lady's,
that he talked away all the rest of the evening, and was the life of
the company.

'Oh, Margaret Dawson! I sometimes wonder if you're the better off for
leaving us. To be sure you're with your brother, and blood is blood.
But when I look at my lady and Mr. Gray, for all they're so different,
I would not change places with any in England.'

Alas! alas! I never saw my dear lady again. She died in eighteen
hundred and fourteen, and Mr. Gray did not long survive her. As I dare
say you know, the Reverend Henry Gregson is now vicar of Hanbury, and his
wife is the daughter of Mr. Gray and Miss Bessy.