The day after Mr. Kendal’s departure, Mrs. Meadows had another attack, but a fortnight still passed before the long long task was over and the weary spirit set free. There had been no real consciousness and no one could speak of regret; of anything but relief and thankfulness that release had come at last, when Albinia had redeemed her pledge and knew she should no more hear of the dreary ‘very bad night,’ nor be greeted by the low, restless moan. The long good-night was come, and, on the whole, there was peace and absence of self-condemnation in looking back on the past connexion. Forbearance and unselfishness were recompensed by the calm tenderness with which she could regard one who at the outset had appeared likely to cause nothing but frets and misunderstandings.
Had she and Sophy been left to themselves, there would have been nothing to break upon this frame of mind, but early the next day arrived Mr. and Mrs. Drury, upsetting all her arrangements, implying that it had been presumptuous to exert any authority without relationship. It did seem hard that the claims of kindred should be only recollected in order to unsettle her plans, and offend her unostentatious tastes.
Averse both to the proposals, and to the discussion, she felt unprotected and forlorn, but her spirit revived as she heard her brother’s voice in the hall, and she hastened to put herself in his hands. He declined doing battle, he said it would be better to yield than to argue, and leave a grudge for ever. ‘It will not vex Edmund,’ he said, ‘and though you and Sophy may be pained by incongruities, they will hurt you less than disputing.’
She felt that he was right, and by yielding the main points he contrived amicably to persuade Mr. Drury out of the numerous invitations and grand luncheon as well as to adhere to the day that she had originally fixed for the funeral, after which he hoped to take her and the young ones home with him and give her the thorough change and rest of which the over-energy of her manner betrayed the need.
Not that she consented. She could not bear not to meet her letters at once; or suppose Edmund and Gilbert should return to an empty, unaired house, and she thought herself selfish, when it might do so much good to Sophy, &c., &c., &c.—till Mr. Ferrars, going home for a night, agreed with Winifred, that domineering would be the only way to deal with her.
On his return he found Albinia on the stairs, and boxes and trunks carried down after her. Running to him, she exclaimed, abruptly, ‘I am going to Malta, Maurice, to-morrow evening!’
‘Has Edmund sent for you?’
‘Not exactly—he did not know—but Gilbert is dying, and wretched at my not coming. I never wished him good-by—he thinks I did not forgive him. Don’t say a word—I shall go.’
He held her trembling hands, and said, ‘This is not the way to be able to go. Come in here, sit down and tell me.’
‘It is no use to argue. It is my duty now,’ said Albinia; but she let him lead her into the room, where Sophy was changing the bright border of a travelling-cloak to crape, and Maurice stood watching, as if stunned.
‘It is settled,’ continued she, rapidly. ‘Sophy and the children go to the vicarage. Yes, I know, you are very kind, but Maurice would be troublesome, and Winifred is not well enough, and the Dusautoys wish it.’
‘Yes, that may be the best plan, as I shall be absent.’
She turned round, startled.
‘I cannot let you go alone.’
‘Nonsense—Winifred—Sunday—Lent—I don’t want any one. Nothing could happen to me.’
Mr. Ferrars caught Sophy’s eye beaming with sudden relief and gratitude, and repeated, ‘If you go, I must take you.’
‘I can’t wait for Sunday,’ she said.
‘What have you heard?’
She produced the letter, and read parts of it. The whole stood thus:—
‘Bormola, 11 p.m., February 28th, 1855.
‘Dearest Albinia,
‘I hope all has gone fairly well with you in my absence, and that Sophia is well again. Could I have foreseen the condition of affairs here, I doubt whether I could have resolved on leaving you at home, though you may be spared much by not being with us. I landed at noon to-day, and was met in the harbour by your cousin, who had come off in a boat in hopes of finding you on board. He did his best to prepare me for Gilbert’s appearance, but I was more shocked than I can express. There can no longer be any doubt that it is a case of rapid decline, brought on by exposure, and, aggravated by the injury at Balaklava. Colonel Ferrars fancies that Gilbert’s exertions on his behalf in the early part of his illness may have done harm, by preventing the broken bone from uniting, and causing it to press on the lungs; but knowing the constitutional tendency, we need not dwell on secondary causes, and there is no one to whom we owe a deeper debt of gratitude than to your cousin, for his most assiduous and affectionate attendance at a time when he is very little equal to exertion. They are like brothers together, and I am sure nothing has been wanting to Gilbert that he could devise for his comfort. They are in a tolerably commodious airy lodging, where I found Gilbert propped up with cushions on a large chair by the window, flushed with eager watching. Poor fellow, to see how his countenance fell when he found I was alone, was the most cutting reproach I ever received in my life. He was so completely overcome, that he could not restrain his tears, though he strove hard to command himself in this fear of wounding my feelings; but there are moments when the truth will have its way, and you have been more to him than his father has ever been. May it be granted that he may yet know how I feel towards him! His first impression was that you had never forgiven him for his unfortunate adventure with Maurice, and could never feel towards him as before; and though I trust I have removed this idea, perhaps such a letter as you can write might set his heart at rest. Ferrars says that hitherto his spirits have kept up wonderfully, though latterly he had been evidently aware of his condition, but he has been very much depressed this evening, probably from the reaction of excited expectation. On learning the cause of Lucy’s desertion, he seemed to consider that his participation in the transactions of that night had recoiled upon himself, and deprived him of your presence. It was very painful to see how he took it. He was eager to be told of the children, and the only time I saw him brighten was when I gave him their messages. I am writing while I hope he sleeps. I am glad to be here to relieve the Colonel, who for several nights past has slept on the floor, in his room, not thinking the Maltese servant trustworthy. He looks very ill and suffering, but seems to have no thought but for Gilbert, and will not hear of leaving him; and, in truth, they cling together so affectionately, that I could not bear to urge their parting, even were Fred more fit to travel home alone. I will close my letter to-morrow after the doctor’s visit.’
The conclusion was even more desponding; the physician had spoken of the case as hopeless, and likely to terminate rapidly; and Gilbert, who was always at the worst in the morning, had shown no symptom that could lead his father to retract his first impression.
Mr. Ferrars saw that it would be useless and cruel to endeavour to detain his sister, and only doubted whether in her precipitation, she might not cross and miss her husband in a still sadder journey homeward, and this made him the more resolved to be her escort. When she dissuaded him vehemently as though she were bent on doing something desperate, he replied that he was anxious about Fred, and if she and her husband were engrossed by their son, he should be of service in bringing him home; and this somewhat reconciled her to what was so much to her benefit. Only she gave notice that he must not prevent her from travelling day and night, to which he made no answer, while Sophy hoarsely said that but for knowing herself to be a mere impediment, she should have insisted on going, and her uncle must not keep mamma back. Then Maurice imitatively broke out, ‘Mamma, take me to Gilbert, I wont be a plague, I promise you.’ He was scarcely silenced before Mr. Dusautoy came striding in to urge on her that Fanny and himself should be much happier if he were permitted to conduct Mrs. Kendal to Malta (the fact being that Fanny was persuaded that Mr. Ferrars would obviate such necessity). Albinia almost laughed, as she had declared that she had set all the parsons in the country in commotion, and Mr. Dusautoy was obliged to limit his good offices to the care of the children, and the responsibility of the Fairmead Sunday services.
The good hard-worked brother had hardly time to eat his luncheon, before he started to inform his wife, and prepare for his journey. Winifred was a very good sister on an emergency; she had not once growled since poor Mrs. Meadows had been really ill; and though she had been feeding on hopes of Albinia’s visit, and was far from strong, she quashed her husband’s misgivings, and cheerily strove to convince him that he would be wanted by no one, least of all by herself. A slight vituperation of the polysyllabic pair was all the relief she permitted herself, and who could blame her for that, when even Mr. Dusautoy called the one ‘that foolish fellow,’ and the other ‘poor dear Lucy?’
Albinia and Sophy safe over the fire that evening, after their sorrowful tasks unable to turn to anything else, wondering how and when they should meet again, and their words coming slowly, and with long intervals of silence.
‘Dear child,’ said Albinia, ‘promise me to take care of yourself, and to let Mrs. Dusautoy judge what you can do.’
‘I’m not worth taking care of,’ muttered Sophy.
‘We think you worth our anxiety,’ said Albinia, tenderly.
‘I will not make it worse for you,’ meekly replied Sophy. ‘I don’t think I’m cross now, I could not be—’
‘No, indeed you are not, my dear. We have leant on each other, and when we come home, you will make our welcome.’
‘The children will.’
‘Ah! I think Maurice will behave well. He is very much subdued. I told him he was to do no lessons, and he fairly burst out crying.’
‘Oh, mamma!’ exclaimed Sophy, hurt, indignant, and nearly ready to follow his example.
‘I do not think he has mastery over himself, so as to help being unruly and idle, when he is chained to a spelling-book. I would not for the world set him and you to worry each other for an hour a day, and I shall start afresh with him all the better, when he knows what absence of lessons is, and has forgotten all the old associations.’
‘How could you make him cry?’ said Sophy, in reproach.
‘I believe the tears only wanted an excuse. I did put it on his naughtiness, which usually would have elated him; but his heart was so full as to make even a long holiday a punishment. That boy often shows me what a thorough Kendal he is; things sink into him as they never did into us at the same age, when my aunts used to think I had no feeling. Oh, Sophy! how will you comfort him?’
‘His will be an unstained sorrow,’ said Sophy, from the depths of her heart. ‘O, mamma, only tell Gilbert what you know I feel—no, you don’t, no one can, but what I would not give, to change all I have felt towards him? If I had been like Edmund, and prized his gentleness and sweetness, and the humility that was the best worth of all, how different it would be! But I was proud of despising where truth was wanting.’
‘I should have thought I should have done the same,’ said Albinia; but there was no keeping from loving Gibbie. Besides, he was sincere, except when he was afraid, and he was miserable when he was deceiving.’
‘Yes, after you came,’ said Sophy; ‘but I believe I helped him to think truth disagreeable. I showed my scorn for his want of boldness, instead of helping him. Think of my having fancied he had no courage.’
‘Kindness taught him courage,’ said Albinia. ‘It might perhaps have earlier taught him moral courage. If you and he could have leant against each other, and been fused together, you would have made something like what Edmund was, I suppose.’
‘I drove him off,’ cried Sophy. ‘I was no sister to him. Will you bring me his forgiveness?’
‘Indeed I will; and you may feel sure of it already, dearest. It will make you gentler all your life.’
‘No, I shall grow harder and harsher the longer I live, and the fewer I have to love me in spite of myself.’
‘I think not,’ said Albinia. ‘Humility will make your severity more gentle, and you will soften, and win love and esteem.’
She looked up, but cried, ‘I shall never make up to Gilbert nor to grandmamma!’
Albinia felt it almost as hard to leave her as the two little ones.
When once on her journey, and feeling each moment an advance towards the goal, Albinia was less unhappy than she could have thought possible; she trusted to her brother, and enjoyed the absence of responsibility, and while he let her go on, could give her mind to what pleased and interested him, and he, who was an excellent courier, so managed that there were few detentions to overthrow her equanimity on the way to Marseilles.
But when the Vectis came in sight of the rocky isle, with its white stony heights, the heart-sickness of apprehension grew over her, and she saw, as in a mist, the noble crescent-shaped harbour, the stately ramparts, mighty batteries, the lofty terraces of flat-roofed dwellings, apparently rather hewn out of, than built on, the dazzling white stone, between the intense blue of the sky above and of the sea below. Her eye roamed as in a dream over the crowds of gay boats with white awnings, and the motley crowds of English and natives, the boatmen screaming and fighting for the luggage, and beggars plaintively whining out their entreaties for small coins. Her brother Maurice had been at Malta as a little boy, and remembered the habits of the place enough, as soon as they had set foot on shore, to secure a brown-skinned loiterer, in Phrygian cap, loose trousers, and crimson sash, to act as guide and porter.
Along the Strada San Giovanni, a street of stairs, shut in by high stone walls, with doors opening on either side, they went not as fast as Albinia’s quivering limbs would fain have moved, yet too fast when her breath came thick with anxiety—down again by the stone stairs called ‘Nix Mangiare’ (nothing to eat), from the incessant cry of the beggars that haunt them—then again in a boat, which carried them amid a strange world of shipping to the bottom of the dockyard creek, where, again landing, she was told she had but to ascend, and she would be at Bormola.
She could have paused, in dread; and she leant heavily on her brother’s arm when they presently turned up a lane, no broader than a passage, with low stone steps at irregular intervals. They were come!
The summons at the door was answered by a dark-visaged Maltese, and while Maurice was putting the question whether Colonel Ferrars and Captain Kendal lived here, a figure appeared on the stairs, and beckoned, ascending noiselessly with languid steps and slippered feet, and leading the way into a slightly furnished room, with green balcony and striped blind. There he turned and held out his hand; but Albinia hardly recognised him till he said, ‘I thought I heard your voice, Maurice;’ and then the low subdued tone, together with the gaunt wasted form, haggard aged face, the long beard, and worn undress uniform, with the armless sleeve, made her so realize his sufferings, that, clasping his remaining hand in both her own, she could utter nothing but, ‘Oh! Fred! Fred!’
He looked at her brother with such inquiry, perplexity, and compassion, that almost in despair Maurice exclaimed, ‘We are not too late!’
‘No, thank God!’ said Frederick. ‘We did hope you might come! Sit down, Albinia; I’ll—’
‘Edmund! Is he there!’ she said, scarcely alive to what was passing, and casting another expressively sorrowful look at Maurice, Fred answered, ‘Yes, I will tell him: I will see if you can come in.’
‘Stay,’ said Mr. Ferrars; ‘she should compose herself, or she will only hurt herself and Gilbert.’
‘I don’t know,’ murmured Fred, hastily leaving them.
Maurice understood that Gilbert was even then summoned by one who would brook no delays; but Albinia, too much agitated to notice slight indications, was about to follow, when her brother took her hand, and checked her like a child. ‘Wait a minute, my dear, he will soon come back.’
‘Where’s Edmund? Why mayn’t I go to Gilbert?’ she said, still bewildered.
‘Fred is gone to tell them. Sit down, my dear; take off your bonnet, you are heated, you will be better able to go to him, if you are quiet.’
She passively submitted to be placed on a chair, and to remove her bonnet; and seeing some dressing apparatus through an open door, Maurice brought her some cold water to refresh her burning face. She looked up with a smile, herself again. ‘There thank you, Maurice: I wont be foolish now.’
‘God support you, my dear!’ said her brother, for the longer the Colonel tarried, the worse were his forebodings.
‘Perhaps the doctor is there,’ she proceeded. ‘That will be well. Ask him everything, Maurice. But oh! did you ever see any one so much altered as poor Fred! He looks twenty years older! Ah! I am quite good now! I may go now!’ she cried, as the door opened.
But as Frederick returned, there was that written on his brow, which lifted her out of the childishness of her agitation.
‘My dear Albinia,’ he said in a trembling voice, ‘Mr. Kendal cannot leave him to come to you. He has been much worse since last night,’ and as her face showed that she was gathering his meaning, he pursued in a lower and more awe-struck tone: ‘We think he is sensible, but we cannot tell. It could not hurt him for you to come in, and perhaps he may know you, but are you able to bear it? Is she, Maurice?’
‘Yes, I am,’ she answered; and the calm firmness of her tone proved that she was a woman again. Her hand shook less than did that of her cousin, as silently and reverently he took it, and led her into another room on the same floor.
There, in the subdued light, she saw her husband, seated on the bed, holding in his arms his son, who lay lifted up and supported upon his breast, with head resting on his shoulder, and eyes closed. There was no greeting, no sound save the long, heavily drawn, gasping breaths. Mr. Kendal raised his eyes to her; she silently knelt down and took the wasted hand that lay helplessly on the coverlet, but it moved feebly from her as though harassed by the touch.
‘Gilbert, dear boy,’ said his father, earnestly, ‘she is come! Speak to him, Albinia.’
She hardly knew her own voice as she said, ‘Gilbert, Gibbie dear, here I am.’
Those large brown eyes were shown for a few moments beneath the heavy lids, and met hers. The mouth, hitherto only gasping for air, endeavoured to form a word; the hand sought hers. She kissed him, and his eyes opened wide and brightened, while he said, ‘I think it is pardon now.’
‘Pardon indeed!’ said his father, with a greater look of relief than Albinia understood, ‘you are resting in His Merits.’
Gilbert’s look brightened, and he said, ‘I know it now.’
‘Thank God,’ said Mr. Kendal.
His eyes closed, and Fred whispered to the father, ‘Maurice is here too.’
Again the light woke in the eye, with almost a smile, the look that always welcomed the little brother; and Albinia grieved to say, ‘Not little Maurice, though he longed to come; it is my brother.’ But the air of eagerness did not pass away, and he seemed satisfied when Mr. Ferrars came in. It was as a priest, speaking words not his own; and Albinia and Fred knelt with him. At the close of each prayer or psalm, Gilbert signed imploringly for more, even like our mighty dying queen; and at each short pause, the distressed agonized expression would again contract the brow, though in the sound of the holy words all was peace. The Psalm of the Good Shepherd with the Rod and Staff in the Valley of the Shadow of Death, recurred so strongly to Maurice, that he repeated it like a cadence after each penitential supplication, every time bringing a look of peace to the countenance of the sufferer.
They must have remained long thus, Fred had grown exhausted with kneeling and had been forced to sit on the floor, and Maurice’s voice waxed low and hoarse; yet he durst not pause, though doubting whether Gilbert could follow the meaning. At length the eyes were again raised. With a start as of haste, Gilbert looked full at Albinia, and said, ‘Thank you. Tell Maurice—’ He could not finish, and there was an agony for breath, then as his father raised him, he contrived to say, ‘Father—mother—kiss me; it is forgiven!’
Another look brought Fred to press his hand, and he smiled his thanks.
There were a few more terrible minutes, from which they would fain have led away Albinia, but suddenly his brow grew smooth, his eyes were eagerly fixed as on something before him, and as if replying to a call, he said, ‘Yes!’ with a start and a quiver of all his limbs, and then—
The first words were Mr. Kendal’s. ‘Edmund has come for him!’
It was to the rest as if the father had been in some manner conscious of the presence of the one twin-brother, and, were resigning the other to his charge, for he calmly kissed the forehead, closed the eyes, laid down the form, he had so long held in his arms, and after a few moments on his knees, with his face hidden, in his hands, he rose with composure, and said to his wife, ‘I am glad you were in time.’
Had he given way, Albinia would have been strong, but there was no need to support to counteract the force of disappointment and grief, acting upon overwrought spirits, and a fatigued, exhausted frame. Were these half-conscious looks and broken words all she had come for, all she should ever have of Gilbert? This was the moment’s predominant sensation; she was past thinking; and though she still controlled herself, she cast a wild, piteous eye on her husband, and as he lifted her up, she sank on his breast, not fainting, not sobbing, but utterly prostrated, and needing all his support as he led her out, and laid her on a couch in the next room, speaking softly as if hoping his voice would restore her. ‘We had some faint hope of you; we knew you would wish it, so you see all is ready. But you have done too much, my dear: Maurice should not have let you travel so fast.’
‘No, no,’ said Albinia, catching her breath. ‘Oh! not to have come sooner!’ and she gave way to a violent burst of tears, during which he fondled and soothed her till she suddenly said, ‘I did not come here to behave in this way! I came to help you! Edmund, what shall I do?’ and she would have started up.
‘Only lie still, and let me take care of you,’ said he. ‘Nothing could be to me like your coming,’ and she was forced to believe his glistening eyes and voice of tenderness.
‘Can you keep quiet a little while,’ said Mr. Kendal, wistfully, ‘while I go to speak to your brother? It was very good in him to come! Don’t speak; I will come back directly.’
She did lie still, for she was too much spent to move, and the silence was good for her; for if the overwhelming sensation of grief would sweep over her, on the other hand, there was the remembrance of the look of peace, and the perception that her husband was not as yet so struck to the earth as she had feared. He was not long in returning, bringing some coffee for her and for himself, and speaking with the same dreamy serenity, though looking excessively pale. ‘Your brother told me to give you this,’ he said. ‘I am glad the colonel is under such care, for he is terribly distressed and not at all fit to bear it. I could not make him go to bed all last night.’
‘You were up all last night, and many nights before,’ said Albinia; ‘and all alone! Oh! why was I not here to help!’
‘Fred was a great comfort,’ said Mr. Kendal. ‘I cannot describe my gratitude to him. And dearest—’ He paused, and added with hesitation, ‘I do not now regret the having come out alone. After the first disappointment, I think that my boy and I learnt to know each other better. If he had left me nothing but the recollection that I had been too severe and unsympathizing to win his confidence, I hardly know how I could have borne it.’
‘He was able to talk to you, then?’ cried Albinia. ‘That was what I always wished! Yes, it was right, so it came right. I had got between you as I ought not to have done, and it was well you should have him to yourself.’
‘Not as you ought not,’ he fondly answered. ‘You always were his better angel, and you came at last as a messenger of peace. There was relief and hope from the moment that he knew you.’
He told her what could scarcely have passed his lips save in those earlier hours of affliction. It had been a time of grievous mental distress. Neither natural temperament nor previous life had been such as to arm poor Gilbert to meet the King of Terrors; and as day by day he felt the cold grasp tightening on him, he had fluttered like a bird in the snare of the fowler, physically affrighted at the death-pang, shrinking from the lonely entrance into the unknown future, and despairing of the acceptableness of his own repentance. He believed that he had too often relapsed, and he could not take heart to grasp the hope of mercy and rest in the great atonement. The last Communion had been melancholy, the contrite spirit unable to lift itself up, and apparently only sunk the lower by the weight of love and gratitude, deepening the sense of how much had been disregarded. There had since been a few hopeful gleams, but dimmed by bodily suffering and terror; and doubly mournful had been the weary hours of the night and morning, while he lay gasping away his life upon his father’s breast. Having at first taken the absence of his stepmother as a sign that she had not forgiven him, he had only laid aside this notion for a more morbid fancy that the deprivation was a token of wrath from above; and there could be little doubt that her final appearance was hailed as a seal of pardon not merely from her. Her brother, who had raised him up after his last fall, was likewise the person above all others to bring the message of mercy to speed him to the Unseen, where, as his look and gesture had persuaded his father, his brother, or some yet more blessed one, had received and welcomed the frail and trembling spirit.
That last farewell, that dawn of peace, so long prayed for, so ardently desired, had given Mr. Kendal such thankfulness and relief as sustained him, and enabled him to support his wife, who knew not how to meet her first home grief; whereas to him sorrow had long been a household guest more familiar than joy; and he was more at rest about his son than he had been for many a year. He could dwell on him together with Edmund, instead of connecting him with shame, grief, and pain; though how little could he have borne to think that thus it would end, when in the springtime of his manhood he had rejoiced over his beautiful twin boys.
He knew his son better than heretofore. After the first day’s disappointment, Gilbert had found him all-sufficient, and had rested on his tenderness. All sternness had ceased on one side, all concealment on the other, and the sweetness of both characters had had full scope. Gilbert’s ardent love of home had shown itself in every word, and his last exertion, had been to write a long letter to his little brother, which had been completed and despatched by a private hand a few days previously. He had desired that Maurice should have his sword, and mentioned the books which he wished his sisters to share, talking of Sophy as one whom he honoured much, and wished he had known better; but much pained by hearing nothing from Lucy, and lamenting his share in her union with Algernon. He had said something about his wish that the almshouses should be built, but his father had turned away the subject, knowing that in case of his dying intestate and unmarried, the property was settled on the sisters, and seeing little chance of any such work being carried out with the co-operation of Mr. Cavendish Dusautoy. Latterly he had spoken of Genevieve Durant; he knew better how unworthy of her he had been, and how harassing his pursuit must have appeared, but he could not help entreating that her pardon might be asked in his name, that she might hear that he had loved her to the last, and above all, that his father would never lose sight of her; and Mr. Kendal’s promise to regard her as the next thing to his daughters had been requited with a look of the utmost gratitude and affection.
This was the substance of what Mr. Kendal told his wife as they sat together, unwitting of the lapse of time, and shrinking from any interruption that might mar their present peace and renew the sense of bereavement.
Mr. Ferrars was the first to knock at the door. He had been doing his utmost to spare both them and Fred, who needed all his care. These four months of mutual dependence had been even more endearing than the rescue of Fred’s life on the battlefield; and he declared that Gilbert had done him more good than any one else. They had been so thrown together as to make the ‘religious sentiment’ of the younger tell upon the warm though thoughtless heart of the elder. They had been most fondly attached; and in his present state, reduced by wounds and exhausted by watching, Fred was more overpowered than those more closely concerned. He could hardly speak collectedly when an officer of the garrison called to consult him with regard to a military funeral, and it was for this that Maurice was obliged to refer to the father. There were indeed none of his regiment in the island, but there was a universal desire in the garrison to do honour to the distinguished young officer, for whom great interest had been felt and the compliment brought a glow of exultation to Mr. Kendal’s face, as he expressed his warm thanks, but desired that the decision might rest with Fred himself, as his son’s lieutenant-colonel.
Maurice felt himself fully justified in his expedition when he found that all devolved on him, even writing to Sophy, and making the most necessary arrangements; for the colonel was incapable of exertion, Albinia was prostrated by the shock, and Mr. Kendal appeared to be lulled into a strange calm by the effects of the excessive bodily weariness consequent on the exhausting attendance of the last few days. They all depended upon Mr. Ferrars, and recognised his presence as an infinite comfort.
In the morning Albinia came forth like one who had been knocked down and shattered, weary and gentle, and with the tears ever welling into her eyes, above all when she endeavoured to write to Sophy; and she showed her ordinary earnestness only when she entreated to see her boy once more. Her husband took her to look on the countenance settled into the expression of unearthly peace, but she was not satisfied; it was not her own Gilbert, boyish, sensitive, dependent, and shrinking. The pale brow, the marked manly features, the lower ones concealed by the brown moustache, belonged to the hero who had dared the deadly ride and borne his friend through the storm of shot and shell; the noble, settled, steadfast face was the face of a stranger, and gave her a thrill of disappointment. She gloried in the later Gilbert, but the last she had seen of him whom she loved for his weakness, had been when she had not heeded his farewell.
It made the pang the less when evening came and he was carried to his resting-place. They would have persuaded Frederick to spare himself, but as the only officer of the same corps, as well as for the sake of many closer ties, he would not hear of being absent, and made his cousin Maurice do his best to restore the smart soldierly air which he for the first time thought of regretting.
Gilbert’s horse had perished at Balaklava, but his cap, sword, and spurs, were laid on the coffin, and from her shaded window Albinia watched it borne between the files of soldiers with arms reversed; and the procession of officers whose bright array contrasted with the colonel’s war-worn dress, ghastly cheek, and empty sleeve, tokens of the reality of war amid its pageantry, as all moved slowly away to the deep tones of the solemn Dead March, music well befitting the calm grandeur of the face she had seen, and leaving her heart throbbing with the deep exulting awe and pathos of a soldier’s funeral. She knelt alone, and followed the burial service in the stillness of the room overlooking the broad expanse of blue sea and sky; and by-and-by, through the window came the sound of the volley fired over the grave, the farewell of the army to the soldier at rest, his battles ended.
‘There was peace, and there was glory; but she could not divest herself of a sense of unreality. She could not feel as if it were really and truly Gilbert, and she were mourning for him. All was like a dream—that solemn military spectacle—the serene, grave sunshine on the fortress-harbour stretching its mailed arms into the sea—the roofs of the knightly old monastic city rising in steps from the bay crowded with white sails—and even those around her were different, her husband pale and still, as in a region above common life, and her cousin like another man, without his characteristic joyousness and insouciance. She could hardly induce herself, in her drowsy state, to believe that all was indeed veritable and tangible.
There was nothing to detain them at Malta, and Mr. Ferrars, who arranged everything, thought the calm of a sea-voyage would be better for them all than the bustle and fatigue of a land journey.
‘Kendal himself does not care about getting home,’ he said to Fred, who was afraid this was determined on his account. ‘I fear many annoyances are in store for him. His son-in-law will not be pleasant to deal with about the property.’
With an exclamation Fred started from the chairs on which he had been resting, and dived into his sabre-tasch which hung from the wall. ‘I never liked to begin about it,’ he said, ‘but I ought to have given them this. It was done when he was so bad at Scutari. One night he worked himself into a fever lest he should not live till his birthday, and said a great deal about this Dusautoy making himself an annoyance, perhaps insisting on a sale and turning his father out. Nothing pacified him till, the very day he was of age, we got the vice-consul to draw up what he wanted, and witness it, and so did I and the doctor, and here it is. Afterwards he warned me to say nothing of it when Mr. Kendal came, for he said if the other fellow made a row, it would be better his father should be able to say he had known nothing of the matter.’
‘Does he make his father his heir?’
‘That’s the whole of it. He said his sisters would see it was the only way to get things even, and I was to tell Albinia something about building cottages or almshouses. Ay, “his father was to do what ought to have been done.”’
‘Well, there’s the best deed of poor Gilbert’s life!’
‘Thank you,’ mumbled Fred, hall drolly, half gravely.
‘Ay, Kendal and Albinia will do more good with that property than you have thought of in all your life, sir.’
‘Their future and my past,’ laughed Fred, adding more gravely, ‘Scamp as I am, there’s more responsibility coming on me now, and I have gone through some preparation for it. If I can get out to Canada—’
‘You will not lessen your responsibilities,’ said Maurice, smiling, ‘nor your competency to meet them.’
‘I trust not,’ said Fred.
Mr. Ferrars read in his countenance far more than was implied by those words. The General, by treating him as a boy, had kept him one, and perhaps his levity had been prolonged by the rejection of his first love; but a really steady attachment had settled his character, and he had been undergoing much training through his own sufferings, Gilbert’s illness, and the sense of the new position that awaited him as commanding officer; and for the first time Maurice, who had always been very fond of him, felt that he was talking to a high-principled and right-minded man instead of the family pet and laughing-stock.
‘I suppose,’ he said, ‘that you cannot have heard often from Montreal since you have been in the East.’
‘No. If my letters are anywhere, it is at the Family Office. I desired them to be forwarded thither from head-quarters, not expecting to be detained here. But,’ cried Fred with animation, ‘what think you of the General actually writing to Mr. Kinnaird from Balaklava?’
‘It would have been too bad if he had not.’
‘I believe he did so solely to make me sleep, but it is the first time he has deigned to treat the affair as anything but a delusion, and he can’t retract now. Since that, poor Gilbert has made a scrap or two of mine presentable, and there’s all that I have been able to accomplish; but I hope it may have set her mind at rest.’
‘Shall I be secretary?’
‘Thank you, I think not. She would only worry herself about what is before me; and if the doctors let me off easy, I had rather report of myself in person.’
His eyes danced, and Maurice thought his unselfishness deserved a reward.
‘My poor Gilbert’s last secret,’ said Mr. Kendal, as he laid before his wife the brief document by which his son had designated him as his sole heir and executor. ‘A gift to you, and a trust to me.’
Albinia looked up for explanation.
‘While he intrusts his sisters to my justice, he tacitly commends to me the works which you wished to see accomplished.’
‘The almshouses! The improvements! Do you mean to undertake them?’
‘It shall be my most sacred duty.’
‘Oh! that we could have planned it with him!’
‘Perhaps I value this the more from the certainty that it is spontaneous,’ said Mr. Kendal. ‘It showed great consideration and forethought, that he said nothing of his intention to me. Had he mentioned it, I should have thought it right to suggest his leaving his sisters their share; and yet, as we are situated with young Dusautoy, it would have been awkward to have interfered. He did well and wisely to be silent.’
‘You don’t expect Algernon to be discontented. Impossible, at such a time, and so well off as he is!’
‘I wish it may be impossible.’
‘What do you mean, to do?’
‘As far as I can see at present, I shall do this. I fear neither the mode of acquisition nor the management of that property was such as to bring a blessing, and I believe my poor boy has made it over to me in order to free his sisters from the necessity of winking at oppression and iniquity. Had it gone to them, matters must have been let alone till Sophia came of age, and even then, all improvements must have depended on Algernon’s consent. The land and houses we will keep, and sufficient ready money for the building and repairs; and to this, Sophia, at least, will gladly agree. The rest—something under twenty thousand, if I remember correctly—is the girls’ right. I will settle Lucy’s share on her so as to be out of her husband’s power, and Sophia shall have hers when she comes of age.’
‘I am sure that will take from Algernon all power of grumbling, though I cannot believe that even he could complain.’
‘You approve, then?’
‘How can you ask? It is the first thing that has seemed like happiness, if it did not make one long for him to talk it over!’ The wound was still very recent, and her spirits very tender, and the more she felt the blessing of the association with Gilbert in the work of love, the more she wept, though not altogether in sorrow.
Mortified at having come so much overworked and weakened, as to occasion only trouble and anxiety, she yielded resignedly when forbidden to wear out strength and spirits by a visit to the burial-ground before her embarkation. She must content herself with Maurice’s description of the locality, and carry away in her eye only the general picture of the sapphire ocean and white rock fortress of the holy warriors vowed to tenderness and heroism, as the last resting-place of her cherished Gilbert, when ‘out of weakness he had been made strong’ in penitence and love.
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