“Un mensonge qui flatte ou blesse le c?ur trouve plus facilement créarice qu’une vérité indéferent.”  
OCTAVEFEUILET.
 
“———Thank God
   the gift of a good man’s love.”
 
ANOLDSTORY.
 
 
 
MALLLINGFORD again! And not looking more cheerful than when we last saw it. Then it was late autumn, now, except for the name of the thing, a scarcely more genial season, early spring.
 
“More genial,” indeed, impresses a comparison strictly speaking, impossible to draw—in Brentshire at least—between either November and February, or February and November; unless we subscribe to the logic of that celebrated individual, the March hare, who tells his bewildered guest, “Alice in Wonderland,” “that it is very easy to have more than, nothing.”
 
Geniality, truly, of any kind, outside or inside, our poor Marion had not met with, through all those cheerless, dreary months at the Cross House. Excepting always the occasional breaks in the cloudy monotony of her life, contrived for her by the watchful thoughtfulness of Geoffrey Baldwin. Not the least of these had been the pleasure of Harry’s company during the Christmas holidays (the last, in all probability, the young man would spend in England for years to come), for which Geoffrey alone was to be thanked. Miss Tremlett would have fainted at the bare idea of having that “dreadful boy” as even a few weeks’ guest. She “tipped” him, however, handsomely, with which proof of her affection Harry was amply content; finding his quarters at the Manor Farm infinitely more to his taste than a residence in the Cross House. Though two miles distant, he managed to see a great deal of his sister; his host being no unwilling coadjutor in this respect. They had plenty of rides together, to which this open winter, in other respects so disagreeable, was favourable; and at times, when braced by the fresh air and exhilarated by the exercise, Marion for a brief space felt almost happy.
 
But only for a brief space. Her life was very repulsive to her, and although she made the best of it to Harry, he saw enough to make him feel for her greatly. Nor did his pity end with the sentiment. In all seriousness the brother offered, rather than condemn her to such an existence, to give up his cherished and chosen intention of entering the army, for which by this time he was fully prepared; and remain near her, with the hopes of in time being able to set up a modest little establishment of their own. He would try for a clerkship in the Mallingford Bank, or take to farming, under Geoffrey Baldwin’s guidance. To neither of which proposals, however, would Marion hear of consenting.
 
“You don’t think so poorly of me, Harry, as to imagine that my life would be any the happier for knowing I had been the means of spoiling yours? Though I love you for offering this, and I will try to be incited by the remembrance of it to more cheerfulness.”
 
Her one woman-friend, the gentle, but brave-spirited Veronica, warmly applauded her unselfish resolution. So, in his heart, for more reasons than one, did Geoffrey Baldwin, though he said nothing.
 
With a face smiling through its tears the poor girl bid her brother farewell.
 
“Only to midsummer, you know, May,” said the boy, “whatever regiment I may get my commission in, I’m sure of some weeks at home first. That’s to say with Baldwin,” he added, for “home,” alas, was a mere memory of the past to the two orphans. “He is so very kind, May. I really don’t know how we are ever to thank him for it.”
 
“He is indeed,” said Marion warmly, so warmly that Harry, who had but small experience of that queer thing, a woman’s heart, smiled to himself, and want away considerably happier in mind about his sister for this corroboration, as he thought it, of a very pleasant suspicion which had lately entered his imagination.
 
“It would suit so capitally,” he thought to himself. “In every way he’s a thorough good fellow. Not so clever as May, certainly, but they’d get on just as well for all that.” Perhaps so, Harry. It is a question, and a not easily answered one, as to how far congeniality of mind is necessary to a happy marriage.
 
But certainly, to give two such different natures as those of Geoffrey Baldwin and Marion Vere, a chance of assimilating in the long run, one element is indispensable, a good foundation of mutual love. Not friendship, however sincere, not esteem, however great—but love—of which the former are but a part. “And not necessarily even that,” say some, from whom nevertheless I differ in opinion.
 
After Harry had gone, it was the old monotonous story again. It was impossible for her to ride so much as while her brother was with them, for the Copley girls were not always to be got hold of, and Mr. Baldwin, as Marion observed with some surprise, rather fought shy of tête-à-tête excursions.
 
“Who would have thought he was so prudish,” she said to herself. “It’s rather misplaced, for I’m sure everybody knows he is just like a sort of uncle or brother to me.”
 
“Everybody” however, in Brentshire, is not in the habit of thinking anything so natural and innocent, and Geoffrey was wise in his generation. Though in this instance really, the Mrs. Grundys of the neighbourhood might have been excused for remarking the very palpable and undeniable fact, that Mr. Baldwin was a remarkably handsome bachelor of only seven or eight and twenty, and Miss Vere “a pretty pale girl” of little more than nineteen. “The sort of girl too that manages to get herself admired by gentlemen, though why I really can’t see,” remarked one of the sister-hood to her confidante for the time. Who in reply observed that “no more could she.” Adding, moreover, that, “Everyone knows what that sort of story-book affair is sure to end in. Young guardian and interesting ward! The girl knew well enough what she was about. Evidently she had not taken up her quarters with that odious Miss Tremlett for nothing. Had her father lived, or left her better off, she might have looked higher. But as things were she had done wisely not to quarrel with her bread-and-butter.”
 
Marion’s visits to Miss Temple, though by reason of her aunt’s unreasonable prejudice, they had to be managed with extreme discretion and not made too frequently, were at this time of great benefit to the girl. The influence of the thoroughly sound and sweet Veronica softened while it strengthened her; and did much to weaken, if not altogether eradicate, a certain root of bitterness, which, not unnaturally, began to show itself in her disposition. She was not given to bosom friendships or confidantes. Though frank and ingenuous, she had, like all strong natures, a great power of reserve. Even to Cissy Archer, the most intimate friend she had ever had, she by no means, as we have seen, thought it necessary to confide all her innermost feelings.
 
Through the circumstances of her life and education, her principle acquaintances, not to say friends, had been of the opposite sex—and to tell the truth she preferred that they should be such—though from no unwomanliness in herself, from no shadow of approach to “fastness,” had she come to like the society of men more than that of women. Rather I think from the very opposite cause—her extreme, though veiled, timidity and self-distrust; which instinctively turned to the larger and more generous nature for encouragement and shelter. It never cost her a moment’s shrinking or hesitation to preside at one of her father’s “gentlemen” dinner parties, where the sight of her bright, interested face and the sound of her sweet, eager voice, were a pleasant refreshment to the brain-weary, overworked men who surrounded the table. Yet in a ball-room, or worse still, in a laughing, chattering party of fashionable girls, Marion, though to outward appearance perfectly at ease—a little graver and quieter perhaps than her companions—at heart was shy and self-conscious to a painful degree.
 
After all, however, it is well for a woman to have one or more good, true-hearted friends of her own sex. And this Marion acknowledged to herself, as she came to know more intimately how true and beautiful a nature was contained in the poor and crippled form of the invalid. Veronica was, I daresay, an exceptional character; not so much as to her patience and cheerful resignation—these, to the honour of our nature be it said, are no rare qualities among the “incurables” of all classes—as in respect of her wonderful unselfishness, power of going out of and beyond herself to sympathise in the joy as well as the sorrow of others, and her unusual wide-mindedness. A better or healthier friend Marion Vere could not have met with. That some personal sorrow, something much nearer to her than the death of her father or the losses it entailed, had clouded the life of her young friend, Veronica was not slow to discover. But she did not press for a confidence, which it was evidently foreign, to the girl’s feelings to bestow. She only did in her quiet way, what little she could, insensibly almost, towards assisting Marion to turn to the best account in her life training this and all other experiences that had befallen her.
 
How different from Geoffrey! Ever so long ago he, honest fellow, had poured out all his story to the friend who had for many years stood him in place of both mother and sister; and by her advice he had acted, in refraining from risking all, by a premature avowal to Marion of his manly, love and devotion.
 
Veronica, poor soul, was sorely exercised in spirit about these two. She loved them both so much, and yet she could not but see how utterly, radically unlike they were to each other. Geoffrey, some few years her junior, had from infancy seemed like a younger brother of her own; and since her illness in particular the gentle kindness, the never-failing attention he had shown her, had endeared him to her greatly. What, on his side, of his real manliness, his simple love of the good and pure, and hatred of the wrong, he owed to this poor crippled woman, is one of the things that little suspected now, shall one day be fully seen. Yet for all this, for all her love for, and pride in him, Veronica made no hero of the young man. She saw plainly that in all but his simple goodness he was inferior to Marion. And seeing this, and coming to love the girl and admire her many gifts as she did poor Veronica, as I have said, was sorely perplexed. She temporized in the first place; till she saw that it was absolutely necessary to do so, she had not the heart to crush poor Geoffrey’s hopes.
 
“Wait,” she said to him, “wait yet awhile. She has had much to try her of late, and there is no time lost. Think how young she is. If you startled her you might ruin all. Wait at least, till the spring.”
 
So Geoffrey bit the end of his riding-whip rather ruefully, thanked Miss Veronica, and much against his will—waited.
 
“It may be,” thought Veronica, “that this is to be one of those unequal marriages, that after all turn out quite as happily, or more so, than those where the balance is more even. Marion, as yet, is hardly conscious of her own powers. Should she marry Geoffrey the probability is she will never become so. Never, at least, in the present state of things. And after all, much power is doomed for ever in this world to remain latent! But, on the other hand—I wish it could be! I do, indeed wish it so much, that I doubt my own clear-sightedness. She will, assuredly, be well able to decide for herself when the question comes before her, as I suppose in time it must. It is Geoffrey I am so troubled about. Should I do better to crush his hopes altogether? I could do so. But then, again, if it should turn out unnecessary! Ah, no! All I can do is to watch and wait. If only he does not ruin his own cause by anything premature.”
 
“If only!” But, alas, there came a day on which, riding back to Mallingford, Geoffrey seeing Marion home after parting with the Misses Copley at the gate a their father’s park, the following conversation took place.
 
It was late in February, a rank, dank, chilly afternoon, such as there had been plenty of this winter. Foggy, too; daylight already growing dim, an hour or more before it had any right to do so.
 
Marion shivered, though not altogether from the cold.
 
“Isn’t it a horrible day, Mr. Baldwin?” she asked; “a perfectly wretched day. Enough to make one wonder that people can be found willing to stay in such an ugly, disagreeable world. And yet there’s something fascinating about it too. I wonder how that is! Let me see; what is it it reminds me of? Oh, I know. It’s that song of Tennyson’s. ‘A spirit haunts the year’s last hours,’ it begins.
 
‘My very heart faints and my whole soul grieves
 At the moist rich smell of the rotting leaves.
          And the breath
          Of the fading edges of box beneath.’
That’s the sort of smell there is to-day, though it’s so chilly. Though that song is for the autumn. But it’s more like autumn than spring just now, isn’t it, Mr. Baldwin? There isn’t the slightest feeling of spring anywhere. No freshness, no life. Everything seems to be decaying.”
 
“I don’t know,” said Geoffrey doubtfully, sniffing the air as he spoke. “Things ain’t looking bad on the whole. You’ll see it will all take a start soon, once the sprouts get their heads above ground. And then just think what a hunting season we’ve had! I declare my horses haven’t had so much taken out of them for I don’t know the time.”
 
“Yes,” said Marion, half amused at her companion’s way of putting things. “To you, I daresay it has seemed a very bright winter, and a cheerful, promising spring. After all, I believe the seasons are as much in us as outside us. Long ago I remember days on which I was so happy, that looking back, I fancy they were in the very brightest and loveliest of the summer, though in reality they were in dreary mid-winter. It is like time, which seems so short when we are happy, so long—so terribly long—when we are in sorrow. And yet in reality it is always the same. I wonder what is reality? Sometimes I think there is no outside at all.”
 
Having arrived at which satisfactory explanation of the mystery of the sensible world, Marion remembered her companion, long ago left behind her, having, as he would have phrased it, had he been in the habit of defining him situations, “come to grief at the very first fence, on leaving the lanes.”
 
“I wish I weren’t so stupid,” he thought to himself. “I wonder if all girls say the same queer, puzzling, pretty sort of things she does.”
 
Not that Marion favoured many people with all the fanciful, dreamy talk—a good deal of it great nonsense, but not commonplace, as she said it, for all that —with which patient Geoffrey was honoured. But she had got into the way of saying to him—before him rather—whatever came into her head, not troubling herself as to whether he understood it or not. Rather a tame-cat way of treating him! But as he was far from resenting it, there is no occasion for us to fight his battles.
 
To the last observation he made no reply. For some minutes they rode along the lane in silence; the horses apparently somewhat depressed in spirit, not being, like Miss Vere, dubious of the reality of an outside world, and a very foggy and disagreeable one to boot. Their feet sank, with each step, into the soft yielding mud, in great measure composed of the all but unrecognizable remains of last year’s leaves, not yet buried decently out of sight, as should have been done by this time. Nature was in a lazy mood that year. There was no sound except the thud, a ruddy, slushy sound, of the tired animals’ slow jogtrot steps.
 
Suddenly Marion spoke again. This time in a different tone. With something of appeal, something of child-like deprecation, she turned to her companion.
 
“Mr. Baldwin,” she said shyly, “you said just now it was almost spring. Don’t you remember promising me that by the spring you would try to do something for me?”
 
“What, Miss Vere?” said Geoffrey, rather shortly. He knew what was coming. He had a presentiment he was going to be sorely tried between the promptings of his heart and the sound advice of his friend Veronica, to which in his inmost mind he subscribed as wise and expedient. So he answered coldly, and hated himself for so doing, while his heart was already throbbing considerably faster than usual.
 
“Oh, don’t be vexed, with me,” she said; “I have not spoken of it for ever so long. Don’t you remember? I am sure you do. It was about trying to arrange for me to live somewhere else than with Aunt Tremlett. Could I not go somewhere as a sort of boarder perhaps? I am sure I should not be difficult to please if they were quiet, kind sort of people, and if I could have a couple of rooms, and be more independent than I am now. The worst of living at the Cross House is that I am never free, except when my aunt is asleep. She is always sending for me or wanting me to do something or other for her, and yet with it all I never can please her. Have you no friends, Mr. Baldwin, who would be willing to let me live with them as a sort of boarder? You see I am quiet and different from other girls. I care very little for gaiety of any kind, and I feel so much older than I am.”
 
Geoffrey rode on in perfect silence, his head turned away from Marion as she made this rather long speech, all in the same tone, half of appeal and half of deprecation. At last she grew surprised at his not replying, and spoke again.
 
“Do answer me, Mr. Baldwin. If you are vexed with me, and think me troublesome and unreasonable, please say so. Only I am so miserable at the Cross House, and you are the only person I can ask to help me.”
 
The last words sounded broken a............